Hopes in the Darkness
by vampirediariesff
Summary: To find her happiness, Elena's putting all of her faith in a spell that is supposed to send her back to 1864 to get a new life. Damon's baby.  Summary Inside.  SEQUEL TO: Endlessly Bound To You.
1. Chapter 1

_Hey everbody! __**This story is the continuation to**__ my previous __**"The Vampire Diaries - Season 3" **__( here : .net/s/7585124/1/The_Vampire_Diaries_Season_3 ) _

_Short Summary:_

Damon was there, watching Elena fall apart, pulling the pieces of her back together. Unconsciously, she was doing the same to his undead soul.

Now, with the Klaus problem resolved, and Katherine trying to find Stefan's lost humanity, Elena wants to deal with her interrupted life. And she's not alone. Damon is next to her.

To make this short happiness be lived in its every single way, she's putting all of her faith in a spell that is supposed to send her back to 1864 to get a new life. Damon's baby.

That would be the only way . And she's willing with every inches of herself to experiment it.

**Soundtrack suggestion: Stefan is Gone – The Vampire Diaries( Season 3 – Score )**

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**Take Your Time – Cary Brothers – The Vampire Diaries Soundtrack ( Season 3x06)**

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**Anna Sun – Walk The Moon – The Vampire Diaries Soundtrack (3x01 )**

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_**Hopes in the darkness**_

_A too vivid memory_

_Author's POV_

_Mystic Falls,1864_

"_Miss Pierce" greeted Giuseppe Salvatore, from the parlour , in a sunny summer morning, as he watched his youngest son holding the arm of the beautiful and charming orphan. Or that's what he thought Katherine was._

"_She's wonderful, isn't she?" Damon's voice echoed in the room, as he approached his father, whose attention had been drawn back to the leather journal in his hands._

"_Enough to be married" the shadow of a smirk crossed his father's lips, as his son froze in shock._

_That, had been his most puzzling and prickly concern over the last few weeks. His love for Katherine, shared with the one of his brother. She would have never wanted the normal life Stefan needed. She, herself, was the exact opposite to normality . Because of what her nature was._

_Damon was well aware of the consequences to his feelings. Choosing to love Katherine meant giving up the human life to the world of the darkness. For the eternity._

_As far as all those years had lead him to understand, his little brother would have never been able to bear the gloom. _

"_So, now Stefan's marriage has become your main concern" Damon hissed, a good hint of jealousy in his voice. Giuseppe didn't miss that. _

"_What, son?" he put his journal aside. "Is your conscience brooding over the choices your younger brother has been bolt and _man _enough to made?" _

"_Katherine's nowhere to be _enough_ for him" Damon spat out his previous reasoning, immediately regretting it. _

Let's face the discussion, now._ He thought._

_His father widened his eyes in shame. "How dare you?" _

_Of course, as much as Giuseppe was kept away from Katherine's deadly secret, he hadn't miss how Damon had swept off her feet. _

"_Your mother would be disappointed, watching how you try to break the finally found peace of your brother!" Giuseppe told off, serious._

"_Oh, please, father. Save me that for my own sake! He can.. marry Katherine, I don't care." his reluctant smirk enlightened his face. _

_If only he knew.. Katherine was meant to be his._

"_I'll be glad the day I'll give them the permission to their marriage. And believe me, it is such a close event." His father's sharp words cut him even more, making him willing to get what he wanted._

_The more somebody didn't want Damon Salvatore to do something, the more he'd do it._

_Elena's POV_

_Mystic Falls, Present Days. _

"And how would the spell work?" I asked Bonnie, both sat on the couch of the Boarding house's parlour.

I knew I needed to come back home to stay with Jeremy, but somehow Damon managed to convince both him and Rick that I needed to be checked on.

They had thought it was because of Finn and Klaus, who had tried and succeeded to abuse on me.

It was true, partly. I hadn't approached a man out of my brother and Damon, lately, and it was impossible for me to tell how it would have felt like.

Damon.

Always there to watch my back. How could I even had been afraid of him, the very first days after the tragedy?

I shook my head.

He was helping me with my eating disorder. He was helping me to_ feel_, again.

We were getting through that together, just as he had promised me.

I loved him. It was him the one that would pop out in my head at the thought of the future. And I wanted it to be perfect.

"I'm trying to get as many details on that as possible" Bonnie nosed into her witchcraft books, written in some kind of unnamed language. I narrowed my eyes.

"It's a complicated spell. Especially the last part. I need to make you come back, not losing what you…_got_ , in the process." She eyed me, aware of my reaction.

I would have gotten a baby.

Damon's.

I wanted my life to be perfect. That would have been the perfect bond.

"Are you sure you wanna do this?" my best friend questioned.

"Why would you think I'm not?" I questioned.

"Because.." she shook her head, cutting it off. "Drop it, it's just so not important"

"Bonnie" I stopped her from the wrist, looking at her in the eyes. "Tell me."

"You're eighteen, Elena." She finally spoke up her fears. "Why would you _want that_ now?"

Because I didn't know if and how long I would have survived, my mind screamed, but the words were untold.

"It's not that early. Women used to have them even before this age. And Katherine, she had hers when she was seventeen. ..And.."

_Who cares if it's now, or in the distance of six years from now?_

Bonnie stopped me, abruptly, widening her eyes. " Do you want to become a vampire?"

I jumped off. "No! Of course I don't." I rushed to explain. " But I want to enjoy the peace that has been given to me, as long as it lasts. I don't know when I'll be able to be this happy, again. "

There was more, of course. But I couldn't tell.

_Some hours later_

"Damon" I called, from upstairs. "Come here"

"What?" his voice from my back didn't startle me.

I smiled, for how much I was getting used to his sudden popping up.

He saw that. "You should frighten" he smirked, sarcastic, getting close to me and placing his hands on the bones of my ankles.

"Should I?" I smiled again, turning to touch his lips with mine. He didn't wait for me to take the next step, but slowly put his tongue inside, brushing my hair and my back.

He pulled my body closer to his, and suddenly interrupted the kiss.

I pouted.

"Why did you call me?" he said, enjoying every second of it.

"You don't deserve to know, now." I turned my back to him once again, and headed towards a big blanket wooden chest under the window of the attic.

"Don't I?" he teased me, blurring behind me. His fingers going up and down my throat, then played on my hip. I rolled back my eyes.

"Damon…" I whispered, out of breath.

His scent smelled of whiskey and of the winter night .

"We can't.. now" we couldn't. Could we? I had been trying to focus on the thing I was doing before he had stopped me, but I couldn't remember.

He, to answer me, stroked his body on my back, making me feel his everything.

His hands went on my blue shirt, unbuttoning it and throwing it on the floor. The tips of his fingers touched my lap, and it felt like ice meeting the lava of a volcano. I sighed, when they started teasing my breast, still held in my bra.

Just as if he read my thoughts, he threw the piece of lace on the other side of the room, enjoying the touch of my bare skin.

Gentle kisses were left on my shoulders, going on my neck, and passing his tongue on it.

"Enough" I said, turning to him, and eagerly trying to tear his black t-shirt off of him.

His sculpted arms took my breath away once more. I traced the shape of his pectorals with the tip of my tongue, as his lungs widened to catch unneeded air.

I grinned, satisfied to have such a power over him.

I went down, to unzip his dark jeans, pulling them down. My teeth played with the border of his boxes, as he stroked my air.

I moaned when I pulled the last piece of clothes that he had, down.

He groaned, pushing me over the wooden chest. My back smashed on it, but I didn't feel the hurt.

There was something else I had my attention kept on.

My hand went on his hard erection ,playing with it for a while, as he placed himself on me and kissed my chest.

Damon placed his hand on mine. "I don't want you to do the _dirty work_" he smirked between the pants.

I beckoned a laugh. "Too late, I guess".

I had some experience with that. Both with Matt and Stefan. But with Damon, it seemed like a different matter.

It felt like doing that for the first time.

My hand was shaking slightly, under his touch.

Damon spread my legs open and fingered me. Slowly at first, making the blood go up on my cheeks, and accelerating my pulse.

Then there was a sudden push, and the tip of his index finger curled to hit my weak spot.

I moaned between my teeth, trying not to scream as I placed my arms on his shoulders, rounding his neck.

Three more fingers reached me, and my back arched suddenly. I felt my bones do a weird noise, but I ignored it, as he cracked himself at making me enjoy his job.

When I reached my climax, I knew his fingers were wet of me.

I was right about it feeling like my first time.

I let out moans, sobs, sighs uncontrollably , piercing my nails into his skin.

He kissed me holding me closer, and I gave in to the tiredness. His hand slowly came out of me, just not as wet as I expected. Even more.

I blushed, unlocking my gaze from his.

"What?" he whispered, leaning in.

"I let you do the dirty work. I wonder whether in your human time you used to be such a polite man" I wondered out loud, almost teasing.

He let out a soft laughter. "Oh, 'll see".


	2. Chapter 2

Drama's soon to come. Next chapter, maybe?

I'm looking forward to reading your reviews. Should this go on or not? Any suggestion for the plot?

I'm really sick at the moment, so I hope the soundtrack was not so badly-chosen.

Soundtrack suggestion: Katherine's Theme –Season 2

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One Republic – All this time

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Birdy – Skinny Love

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**YESTERDAY WAS NINA DOBREV'S BIRTHDAY**! So proud of what she's done so far.

And well.. I covered a song with clips from 3x10. Hope you won't bother if I post the link down here.

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**Now that I finally found you**

_The rain was pouring down my gown, wetting it completely .The weight my body had to bear increased with every step I made, that moved me forward to the meadow. _

_I felt like I had to get out of the woods, and move to the safest place in my reach. That was my biggest concern._

_Fear rushed over me, and I gasped for air. But the drops of the rain made me impossible to breathe evenly._

_The more I tried to rush, the more the mansion seemed distant._

_I turned to face the shadow, as a slim figure appeared in the darkness. It was the reflection of me, wearing the same blue-navy dress I was in. Having her hair curly just like mine was._

_Katherine's fangs glimpsed by the faint light of the moon._

_Then it all faded to the blackness._

I screamed, sitting on the couch where I had fallen asleep the night before, after spending a tiring day at the Boarding House.

_It was just a nightmare._ I kept telling myself as I tried to slow down the pace of my pounding heart.

I was surprised when I realized how sweated I was.

Suddenly, I felt terribly sick, and my head started spinning around as soon as I tried to stand on my feet.

I sighed deeply, closing my eyes and sitting back.

"Elena" a voice called from my back.

I jumped off, and turned around to see Damon just as taken aback as me.

"Why are you even here? What time is it?" I asked with dry voice, still not able to stand up.

I cringed at the fresh air that hit my body when he approached me.

"Late." He stated "Or very early, whatever you want" he smiled softly, kneeling down to face me.

"What?" I whispered, when I figured out he was staring.

"How do you feel?"

"Sick" I pouted.

Damon nodded, as he muttered something that sounded like "Predictable" .

I glared. "Why are you here?"

Was he tracking me down or something? What had gone on?

"I had a nightmare." He shrugged, casual , and held me in his embrace.

I tensed, as he stopped to check on my expression.

"What's wrong?"Damon eyed me.

I fixed my gaze away his "Nothing important" .

I saw him raising an eybrow, form the corner of my eyes. "What was it about?"I asked.

I had this weird feeling growing inside of me, that increased at the sight of Damon going still.

"Katherine" he spat out.

I gasped for air.

He brought me upstairs in my room, and at vampire speed I was under the covers.

"Hadn't you and the psycho gotten.. closer?" Damon demanded, the shadow of one of his smirks covering the concern. His face was a mirrored expression of mine, except for the grin.

"I dreamt of Katherine, too."I announced, as shivers had the best on my trembling body.

I started feeling sick again, my head spun around making me want to throw up.

Damon, who was about to sit next to me, tensed.

"Damn it, you got high temperature" he touched my temples, and I jumped off at the ice-cold contact.

It felt like knives were slowly piercing my head.

I moaned in pain, and Damon's look grew concerned.

"Where's the antibiotic?" he asked, avoiding to touch me again.

"Third drawer under the sink" I managed to whisper,weak.

I closed my eyes, and let the unconscious took control of my mind.

"How long has she been asleep?" a familiar voice arrived faint to my ears.

I slowly opened my eyes, visualizing Bonnie sat right next to me, holding my hand.

"Hey" she greeted, a not very accentuated smile on her face.

I tried to speak, but my throat was way too much dried. So, the only sound that came out was a greeting "mhm".

"How do you feel?" she asked, worried.

I tried to figure that out.

Weakness was still controlling me, but my head seemed to spin around way less than before.

"Better" I cleared my throat.

"It was something out of the ordinary" she turned to speak to someone.

I quickly remembered it was Damon.

I lifted my head , and found him near the headboard. His eyes narrowed as he approached me "What was your dream about?" his hand gently stroked my cheek.

"It was rainy,and I could see nothing. It was back to 1864, as far as I could tell from my dress. Then Katherine appeared and bit me" I watched as both of them froze . "Why?"

"You got to be kidding me" Damon hissed, at nobody in particular.

It was Bonnie who answered to my question, as she saw the expression on my face grow angrier. "Remember when we tried to begin the time spell, last week?"

I nodded.

"Remember how many times I told you it was a really powerful one? And that we would have never been able to know the consequences, until they'd happen?"

"Yes,Bonnie. But it was just a dream."

Damon tensed.

"He had the same dream of yours." She explained,careful. "In the same moment."

"What does it mean, then?" I couldn't get to the point.

"That I think that was a _prediction_". Bonnie finally revealed.

My jaw dropped in astonishment.

"Why would Katherine kill me?" It couldn't be possible. "She's changed."

The answer reached my mind the same moment the words left my mouth.

Oh.

Katherine from 2011.

Not the one from 1864.

Damon hissed at my silence, and walked towards the doorstep. "It can't be done." He announced, his eyes pierced mine. "You can't risk this, do you understand?"

My heart threatened to break. "It's my choice, Damon."

He blurred next to me.

"No." he cupped my head in his hands. "This is not just yours."

"I wanna do it" I told back, confident.

"I won't let you. Not if that means risking your own life. Not now that I finally _found you_".

His blue depth locked into mine, and his eyes became a clear puddle.

Concern, Love…Misery, was what I was able to see.

"Don't cry" he wiped away a tear that wetted my cheek. I was surprised to see the salty water on the tip of his finger.

"I don't want you to hurt you" my voice trembled at the thought of me causing him pain.

Damon froze in hush for an instant, taken aback. "Then don't go and get yourself killed, Elena" he begged for me to listen.

"Damon I want this. I want _him_ with all my soul." Somehow I managed to held my face still, aswell as my voice.

Then there was a long pause.

One of the longest of my entire life.

"If you go back then, and she kills you, none of the two will ever be able to come get it,don't you? You won't only kill yourself, but maybe the baby could follow you along the way."

One more brief pause.

"_I _would follow you."

The thought of Damon.. admitting his everything to me,right in that moment, filled me with love.

Was it wrong to be happy in the misery?

Was it wrong to love him so recklessly ?

Maybe it really was.

But who was I to tell what was right and what was not?

I loved him. That was all that mattered.

And no, I wouldn't have given up.


	3. Chapter 3

_What's up over there? _ _Thank you to all those who comments and follow my story. Keep on reviewing, please! It makes my day! _ _And well.. This was __my tribute to Nina's birthday__. It's a cover of me singing. Hope ya'll enjoy! _ _.com/watch?v=J-o-FscEr34&feature=_

_Soundtrack suggestion :__ TVD Tawgs Salter-Brave __.com/watch?v=BWQjJI2F_Vw&feature=related _ _TVD Stateles- Bloodstream _ _.com/watch?v=llI1x7FhsDA&feature=related _

_Maybe the right turn_

When Damon left I looked around, realizing I was alone.

"Bonnie" I called, and soon after she appeared on the doorstep, a distort expression crossing her face.

"You don't agree with him, do you?" I asked, in unbelief.

She stood there, silent, and I shook my head.

Tears threatened to show, but I held them right in their place.

"'Lena" my best friend approached me, looking at me in the eyes.

"It's already a lot to bear everyone being against me. And now, _you, too_?" I burst out, unable to control my madness.

"He's right, Elena!" Bonnie objected, steady. "If you die in 1864, you'll never come back. Both Damon and Stefan could not protect you. They were human!"

I jumped off at the last name, but quickly had me back "Why should I be killed? Why do we have to screw up the only opportunity left just for fear? " I realized I was screaming, and tried to calm down. "I've risked to die before, for someone who wanted me dead. This time it's _me playing this_ game. It's my life, I wanna live it the way I want it." My eyes pierced hers.

I wanted it so bad. At the same time it reminded me so much of Katherine's attitudes.

She had always been so right about out bond.

Bonnie was silent for a few seconds, since she had obviously been taken aback. "You're sick now because of the dream. " she said, warning "Do you understand the consequences of the spell could be even worse, even more dangerous than this?" she pointed at my figure.

I nodded, obstinate.

"Fine." She finally spoke. "I'll give you one day. I'll come by tomorrow night. It'll be up to you,then." She nodded back, and silently left the room with a "Goodnight, Elena".

_Damon's POV_

I had heard every word of the conversation they had upstairs in the meanwhile I had been waiting on the porch, outside.

"Are you insane, or what, witch?" I lifted my hands and made an exasperate face.

Bonnie closed the door behind her, silent.

"I just have confidence in her. " she crooked an eyebrow. "Don't you?"

Speechless.

That witch had some kind of irritating way to leave me with no words to say, yet too many in my heads that threatened to make it explode.

_Yes._

Elena had grown too much since it all had begun, since the first day she had met my brother, then me.

How could I deny that?

"It's not her I don't trust." I said serious, narrowing my eyes at the thought. "It's Katherine"

"I know" Bonnie cut out, abruptly.

Her face had something that didn't convince me. "What..?"

"I'll make sure she's safe." Again, she left me craving for more answers. I wasn't buying that.

"What do you mean with that?" I tried to keep my hiss just a whisper, failing.

"What I just said." Her big brown eyes searched for something in mine. When they found it, she spoke again. "If I can't go with her, then I'll have someone else helping me"

I thought about it for a second. Who else, apart from Katherine, back then, could be able to save a human from the most dangerous and deadly thing out there?

No way.

"Emily?" I burst out with acknowledgment .

She stayed silent.

"How could _Emily_ possibly help us? Wasn't she and her witchy friends mad at your for using inappropriately your magic? Isn't that exactly what we're going to do? Use your voo-doo for something not concerning vampires?"

"It does concern vampires, Damon. They're the reason why Elena hasn't a normal life."

I was hurt.

"I'm sorry I shouldn't have said that" she quickly apologized, but I didn't care because she was right.

"It doesn't matter" my voice was still serious.

"Who do you think gave me enough power to help you kill Klaus? And to use all those spells in such a short time without getting myself killed?" Bonnie told back, readily.

Again, no way.

"I don't get it how…"I began saying, but she cut me off once more.

"I'll tell you about it tomorrow. I need to _rest_, now." She raised her chin. "Goodnight, Damon"

_Elena's POV._

When I opened my eyes the weather outside was everything but inviting.

I stretched my arms and put a pillow on my face .

"'Morning, sleepy head." Damon's voice was close to my covered ears.

I moaned in response. "I want to sleep. Go away" and turned to the other side.

Surely school was not one of my concerns. Obviously then, Damon wouldn't have let me sleep in.

"What if I don't want you to?" his cocky voice reflected the gesture he made soon after. The pillow that hid me from the light was thrown across the room, making me curse under my breath.

"You're a pain in the ass, Damon"

He chuckled, softly "Yep. Still proud of that."

I finally opened my eyes, and met his melting gaze.

He was glad to see me, but yet I could tell there was something more behind it.

"Are you worried about tonight?"I stroked his check softly, guessing it right.

His hand went on mine, resting there. "Why don't you want to wait? Why now? Why do you want a _baby_ at eighteen?" his concern wasn't hidden anymore.

"Because I don't know if I'll be this happy again" I blurt out, regretting it.

He narrowed his eyes, and sat down on my bed. "Is your fear rushing everything that should happen normally in your life?" he surely didn't expect my question. And he seemed…hurt?

"I..I'm not saying that" I began, babbling. He interrupted me.

"Then what, Elena?" Damon stood up, starting to pace back and forth.

"This life.. is what I could never be grateful enough. You are what makes me feel how I feel now. We can't pretend to be normal, 'cause we _are not, Damon_" I called for his attention by saying his name.

It worked.

He was now staring into my eyes.

"When I thought I was going to die…" I shivered, at the memory. "When Klaus.." was struggling with my own words, as I saw his face showing pity and pain.

"When he was doing that…"

I was living those memories again, I had them well set in my train of thoughts.

The hybrid's face while he was enjoying every second of my sufferance.

While he bit me, as my screams cut the air.

As he abused on me.

Why were my hands trembling so hard?

Damon blurred next to me, to keep them in his hold tight. His words soothed me, a bit. But the memory was still there, vivid, clouding my sight.

"Shh. Elena. Look at me" I tried hard to focus. "I'm right here."

I heard sobs releasing my body. "I thought I had lost it all. What hurt the most was knowing that if I had done everything I had to do before, I wouldn't have _regretted dying_. I wouldn't have felt that way. I could have left in peace."

Tears streamed down my face. "Can you see, now? " I took a deep breath. "This is why, Damon. It's because I love you too much to live with a regret of not having done it in the right way."

He was silent.

Speechless.

And then, his eyes blue as the ocean were filled with water.

A soft smile appeared on his lips, that slightly touched mine.

I had no words coming out. To see how much emotional he had gotten, made me that effect.

Never,before, I had seen him reacting that way.

_Damon's POV_

Could my happiness be compared to everyone else's put together?

Surely not.

"I thought I had lost it all. What hurt the most was knowing that if I had done everything I had to do before, I wouldn't have _regretted dying_. I wouldn't have felt that way. I could have left in peace." Elena wasn't struggling anymore with her own words.

She was sure.

She was certain to love me.

And I found hard to feel anything but the best emotions a soul could feel. I could do nothing but stand there and watch the precious beauty in front of me admitting what I had spent my nights thinking about,for too long.

But not even one thought of mine could have been the equivalent of the reality.

It was way better.

So much to make me wanna pour out my emotions and stream them out. I wasn't the man used to cry, was I?

But I didn't care.

I was the happiest man in the word.

"Can you see, now? " she breathed in, almost intimidated of her deepest secret being shown. She looked down at out twisted hands, unlocking our gazes. "This is why, Damon. It's because I love you too much to live with a regret of not having done it in the right way."

Could the mind of a vampire think of nothing?

Yes.

I tried to replay the words.

I would have supported her.

Because Elena's happiness was all that I could give back to her in trade of her love for me.

I leaned in to kiss her, still in unbelief.


	4. Chapter 4

_LOTS of stuff happening, just so you know!_

_That's why I used the Author's POV, in order not to exclude anyone's perspective, since it's really important to get to see the whole situation._

_What will you find? A good amount of drama, I guess, some.. I can't tell you what, and an evil cliffhanger, maybe? _

_Read and find out!_

_AGAIN: __**THANK YOU TO ALL OF THOSE WHO FOLLOWS THIS STORY, FAVOURITED IT, READ IT AND REVIEWED. **__It makes me smile so much, and keeps me so motivated. I love you so much, guys!_

_NEXT CHAPTER's gonna be entirely an 1864 moment. So hurry up and leave your reviews. I have it ready to be uploaded, I'm just waiting for your feedbacks. Also, should I keep posting the soundtrack suggestion?_

_**SOUNDTRACK SUGGESTION:**__ Time of our Lives – The Vampire Diaries Soundtrack_

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Michael Suby – Passion and Danger

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Michael Suby – Game on

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_Game on_

_Author's POV_

_Knock knock._ The noise that someone made on the door echoed in the hall of the Boarding House, in the absolute silence of that late December evening.

Elena heard that from upstairs – she was still in Damon's room, after a very intimate moment had occurred – and froze in terror.

The pen in her hand went still, not finishing the last line of the sentence in her journal.

"Comin'" Damon blurred out from the shower to the entrance door, spreading it open for Bonnie.

He eyed her.

"You should learn a spell to open locked doors" a grin crossed the perfect face " isn't that a basic?" said the vampire, teasing.

Bonnie glared at him.

She wasn't in the mood of jokes and jerk stuff. She had been trying to concentrate all day long, and even though she had hardly succeeded to sleep: the nightmares just wouldn't let her be.

And surely she was aware how much Damon was tense. His attitude didn't help the cause.

He figured out her train of thoughts, and shrugged, hurrying upstairs.

The powerful witch took a deep breath to focus, sensing Elena.

She followed the invisible thread that connected her to her best friend, just 'till she got into Damon's room.

"Hey" Bonnie greeted, in a low voice.

Elena had her gaze still on the pages of the diary, and sat silent in the middle of the king sized bed, her very slim figure leaned on the headboard.

Bonnie was relieved at the thought that her collar bones wasn't sticking out as it used to be one month before, when that devil of a disease was sucking her life out of her.

Elena was startled. "Hi" she beckoned.

The witch approached her, just like the night before.

"Are we going to do this?" Bonnie asked, although she already knew the answer would have been positive.

_Stubborn_, reckless Elena.

She also was her best friend, her sister, the most important thing she had left after her family.

Bonnie wouldn't have disappointed her.

Instead, this time, it was Elena who sort of took aback Bonnie, as she simple limited to nod.

"What's wrong, hun?" Bonnie asked caring and maternal.

"I think it's okay to be scared, isn't it?" the deep brown cat-like eyes of the young doppelganger sough for approval in hers.

" Yeah" Bonnie rushed to soothe "But _of what_, exactly?"

Elena seemed to think about what was in her mind twice, after spitting it out "It's not death that scares me. It's the thought of leaving _the ones_ I love"

Her answer had taken a slightly different turn from her best friend's question.

But that was just the result of a deep and mature train of thought that must have haunted Elena all night long, just like the nightmares had with Bonnie.

From the shower of the mutual bathroom of the storey – no way Damon would have used Stefan's, as long as he would have denied that, it would have been purely masochistic to invade his brother's stuff- the ebony haired vampire hadn't missed the last sentence his _girlfriend_ .

Hell, if _girlfriend _sounded weirdly pleasant to think. He didn't mean to eavesdrop, but the changing of the pacing of Elena's heart was responsible of his sin.

He loved her enough not to take the power over her. Even if it hurt him to know that Elena was aware of the possibility of her death.

"You know nobody's forcing you" Bonnie tried to justify her, but the human glared, interrupting the sentence.

"Obviously you won't step back, _will you_?" the witch's hurt was shown in her voice for a second, and her eyes filled with tears, that weren't set free.

"Come here" Elena comforted her. The situation should have been reversed, but it was Elena we were talking about. Stubborn and reckless as you might wish, she would have always been the caring and loving human girl that had stolen undeads' hearts.

_Boarding House- Half an hour later_

"So basically the spell's gonna work like this" Bonnie explained, opening her grimoire in the parlour of the mansion.

"Wait" she said to herself. An over-the nervousness Damon questioned her. "What?"

She looked around, then her eyes met the vampire's . "Is it here that you wanna do it?"

"Why?" Elena put herself in the conversation, eying both of them with concern and awareness.

Bonnie took a deep breath, hoping not to freak her best friend out "You're gonna be … Let's say a _sleeping-dead_ person until the time you _come back_. You're supposed to lay down during the whole event"

"Fine" Damon concluded, abruptly."You can use my bedroom."

Bonnie nodded, and silently headed upstairs. "I'll go get myself some candles."

She had actually sensed how much the two lovers needed one last time on their own, before the storm.

"Damon" Elena turned to him, rushing to his side.

He didn't look at her, instead he went to pour some Bourbon in a glass.

"Damon" Elena's voice raised, reaching the edge. One hand went grabbing his black shirt, the other brushed his cheek, trying to make his face turn in her direction.

"Please look at me" her voice was as steady as ever.

But when her gaze met his all of her confidence threatened to be shattered because of the fear those blue depths refelected .

Damon had never been so vulnerable.

And he hated it. He hated feeling that way.

But most of all, he could not stand the cause that had provoked that feeling.

It was because he wasn't human. Because of his damned nature that Elena was risking her life.

Guilt now was occupying a bigger and bigger place in his unlimited mind.

"It's all my fault" he blurt out.

Elena couldn't believe his words. How could that possibly be his fault?

"Why? Why would you blame yourself for.."she shook her head in disbelief and compassion, but his sharp voice quickly cut her out, the hurt on her face was shown.

"Because of who I am, Elena! Because I'm dead, and because I could never love you the right way!" he threw the glass on the opposite side of the room, as the girl was startled at the sudden gesture .

Her eyes grew wide with fear of his reactions and pain from the guilt that was spread all over her body.

Sobs grew in her chest. "Don't you get it? There's nothing _wrong_ with you. That's exactly the way I want to be loved. "

Why did her knees feel so weak? They trembled, as she gave in to the tiredness and fell down.

They didn't hit the ground, though. Damon caught her before that.

"I'm sorry" he whispered, brushing his forehead against hers. "I'm sorry I can't give you the life you wanted".

"Shh" she tried to soothe him, even though her tears wouldn't forsake her cheeks. "I wouldn't have had a life, if It wasn't for you" she half smiled, stroking his cheek.

Damon closed his eyes, enjoying the touch, and nodding slightly.

Then there was nothing left for the next couple of minutes.

Just the crackling of the fire. Just their breaths united.

"Let's go,then" he finally broke the silence, taking the hold of her cold hand.

_(A/N. : Start playing Michael Suby's .com/watch?v=0VyJX-I5lLQ now. )_

Bonnie had gotten everything set.

Candles were occupying the four corners of the bed, and they were the only faint light that illuminated the room.

The grimoire was open wide on the floor, and one more small white candle gave her the chance to read that unknown language.

"It's ready" she turned to them, sensing their presence.

A rush of fear run down Elena's spine. She tried to ignore it.

"There's a few more things you need to know before you leave. According to the legends, the doppelganger is a _ghostly_ double of a living person that haunts its living counterpart. Don't expect Katherine or anyone else who's a vampire in town, not to figure that out." Bonnie warned wisely, raising her finger. "You won't fool them. So be careful. Don't walk around Mystic Falls at night, that's your only advantage: the sun rings used to work only on Pearl, Anna and Katherine. You shouldn't _fear_ the first two."

Nobody missed how Bonnie's voice hesitated at the very last words.

Elena tried to deflect the subject. "What's the specific day you're going to send me to?" she sighed, when she felt Damon's hand tightening above hers. The girl brushed it back.

"As close as I can to Katherine's arrival " Bonnie nodded to herself, fixing her gaze into her best friend's. "Then you have two weeks, Elena" she said slowly. "After then, time's over. Whatever you've succeeded to do. Or _not_" she warned her.

"One last thing." The witch's tone went cold. "Don't mess up with the events of the past. Whatever you will do, different from what has been done, will change the future"

It felt like if Elena was about to run out of breath. Fear was having the best of her, when she realized it was all up to her actions.

"That means" Bonnie warned. "You know the story. Damon and Stefan are supposed to fall in love with her, fight and _then die_. You won't try to get into that process. Is _that clear_, Elena?"

She nodded, unable to do anything else.

This time it was just her who tensed.

Damon's hands went on her shoulders, massaging them. "It'll be okay" he whispered in her ear. "You'll do it right."

And as those words were said, she found herself back again.

She could win. She owed Damon one. She would have given him a normal life back.

"Let's begin"

"Lay on the bed." Bonnie ordered, as dead silence filled the room.

Elea found it hard to let go of Damon's.

He grabbed her arms, turning her to face him. And then their lips met, in a sweet and loving way.

Never , anybody could have imagined Damon could be such of a gentleman.

She stroked his cheek one last time and went on his bed.

"What now?" Elena demanded, trying to hide the storm that was forming in her stomach.

"Give me your left hand." The witch demanded, as Damon tensed and Elena layed down.

A slim knife was taken out from Bonnie's pocket. It glimpsed even in the faded light.

Elena jumped out a bit, taken aback. She obeyed soon after.

What could _a cut_ be?

Her gaze didn't leave Damon's, who apprehensive and helpless stood there watching.

He clenched his fists, holding to something that gave him the strength in her brown eyes.

"Sancti tempu .." some words close to latin left the witch, as she closed her eyes to cut the vein on Elena's wrist.

The girl widened her eyes when she felt the cold material piercing slowly her skin.

Hell, if it hurt.

She bit her lower lips to held back the pain, succeeding.

But as soon the feeling invaded her, it left her body.

Some kind of a dizziness obfuscated her more and more, rendering her sight cloudy and unclear.

The last thing she felt was her own hands on the place of her heart.

The last thing she saw was those ocean-like cold blue puddles.

It was a quiet meadow the first thing I saw.

The chirping of the birds and the soft sound of the breeze running through the leaves of the trees were the only things that broke the quiet and pleasant silence.

I looked around to find something familiar.

The sight of a big and fancy white Victorian mansion made my jaw drop.

It was better than movies would show you.

I took a deep breath and placed my hands on my tiny and rigid tights. I figured out that it was a tight corset under a navy-blue silk material that caused that.

I brushed my fingers on the fabric of my stunning dress, then on the voluminous and flashy gown.

I smiled, but I actually think it was the closest expression to a grin of victory.

Bonnie had succeeded.

A sudden noise came from my back.

I turned, and almost got an heart attack when something from the darkness of the wood approached me.

It was coming.

_In the meanwhile…_

Katherine was sat on the couch of the Motel's room both Stefan and her had decided to rent for one night.

They were in Florida, and soon enough they would have made it to Jacksonville.

Of that, she was excited. A grin framed her perfectly shaped lips.

Now that the Klaus drama was over, she needed some time for herself.

Of course she would have liked to share it with a more willing Stefan, but he didn't seem to take his recovery so well.

He had barely said some words, except for the animated conversation in the car the night they had left Mystic Falls.

_"Would you __care__?" She had questioned him, hoping for some of his emotions to be shown, leaning in, her voice soft with a thread of tenderness._

_"Something inside of me wishes I could" Stefan was honest. "But I can't."_

_"Does that thing inside of you called conscious want you to care about me?" that dangerously beautiful little woman, so able to turn someone's words._

_Would her manipulative skills be enough to get the ripper back to his humanity?_

_"I will _never _love you, Katherine." He was convinced of his statement. "So, stop hoping. It could _break_ that almost _invisible_ heart that you have, so _well hidden_"._

_Katherine jumped off, a bit. Her eyes went on the road to hide it._

_Couldn't she actually feel anything?_

_Or… had he hit the right spot?_

_"Well.." her voice went unsteady. Stefan didn't miss that. He eyed her. " It's a pity. You know why? " she asked, rhetorical, as she stared back at him. "Because I __love you__, Stefan."_

_She didn't look away. Instead, she wanted to prove how true her words were._

_How much, in so many years, the only man that had changed all of her plans, the only one she'd been thinking of for 147 years, was the one standing right in front of her._

_She parted her lips to lean in and kiss him, but she stopped._

_It was so not Katherine._

_So not herself._

_But that's what loving someone did._

_The only thing that could explain the act was the fear of being pushed back._

_"What is love to you?" Stefan spelled every single word carefully._

_A brief pause, then the answer came out sharply and…hoping. For some change. "Never giving up. It means waiting. And I will, Stefan__. I will wait forever__" Katherine stated, firmly and solemn._

_"All I need is a little bit of hope…" was her whisper, in order not to make her voice, tired from the previous revelation, unsteady._

_"Hope for what?" he asked, cocky. It was as if he was amusing himself watching the manipulative bitch getting hurt._

_Katherine saw that. "Hope that maybe" she looked away, shaking her head casually. " If I change…" she narrowed her eyebrows, finding it difficult to continue. Then again, their eyes met. He was almost making fun of her, but she needed to push him to the edge. To make him feel even the furthest feeling. "If I can prove to you that I'm _worth loving_…"_

_Her hopes were up when Stefan's narrowed expression crossed his face, all of a sudden. "Maybe someday, I'll be that girl for you again." There you go, she had completely exposed._

A sudden deep breath inside of her made her have herself back from the bitter memory.

_Just one more scar to collect, Kath _ her mind was her best medicine to the…sadness( could it actually be it?) She felt.

"Katherine" someone's really well known voice called her steadily, from behind the couch.

Stefan was leaning on the closed door, his eyes piercing with something that stopped the breathing in her chest.

"What's wrong with you?" She beckoned an aware question.

His eyes went enlightened by a weird hint of impatience.

Stefan approached. "It's you".

**HOPE YOU LEAVE AS MANY REVIEWS AS YOU CAN; I WON'T BITE YOU. DAMON WILL STOP BY YOUR HOME TO THANK YOU FOR COMMENTING THIS FANFICTION, HE'S THE ONE WHO SUGGESTS ME THE STUFF TO WRITE,YA KNOW? :3**

**REVIEW REVIEW REVIEW REVIEWWWWWWWWWW! The more you comment, the faster the next chapter's out! **


	5. Chapter 5

_I know I'm not gonna put the soundtrack, but I actually couldn't find the right one for this chapter. Silence is the best company for this next reading. JUST ENJOY!_

_I want to thank everybody who's reading this, and reviewing._

_You guys are amazing._

_6__th__ chapter's going to be an author pov, to get the look of the whole scene and each character's thoughts. If Elena thought the old Damon was a quiet and calm type, well.. She'll have to change her mind about his temper. You'll see ;D_

_**Family Meeting **_

The sinister sound that came from the black spot in front me seemed to increase, along with the pace of my heart.

I tried to outrun the enemy that threatened to get closer to me.

I could feel the lungs inside of my chest fighting against the hard material of the corset, that made me impossible to breathe evenly. I opened my mouth not to run out of breath.

It seemed quiet, for a while.

However, I didn't dare to look back. Instead I kept on trying to reach the house in front of me. Hoping that somebody would have let a stranger in.

Panicking, the adrenaline rushing through my veins gave me the unexpected strength to go even faster.

The fear of my dream, which was now becoming vivid and true, occupied a bigger and bigger place in my mind. And the only thing that my brain could process and scream louder than anything else was "_Run!_"

I obeyed, but the gown was too long. The dress too tight.

The huge garden in front of me never seemed to change. It was like if I wasn't moving at all.

I knew that was only because I was afraid.

A dead wood stood in my way. And I fell down, in a slow motion, facing myself to the ground.

A fearing scream left me when one hand was placed on my right shoulder, and the fingers stuck inside my body to make me stop and turn to the threaten.

"Let go of me" I cried in terror.

Then I froze, taken aback from a completely different feeling.

The soft rays of the December sun enlightened the dark ebony hair of the young and stunning man in front of me.

Damon.

He slowly knelt down, locking his gaze into mine .

Just then I realized there was something different. Right in those blue depths.

It was _innocence_. Those 147 years of suffering had changed and shaped Damon, making him the man he was in the present days.

And that thought made me love him even more. And made me feel special, since I had been the one who'd brought him to life back again.

All of a sudden, curiosity took the best of me. I couldn't wait to find out the man he was in 1864. The one who had barely _started_ to experience the world.

"I had no intentions in scaring you, Miss Katherine" his charming voice lacked that hint of constant sarcasm.

I widened my eyes, afraid of what I could have said or done in the wrong way. Eventually, I cleared my throat and spoke.

"No need to worry. You just took me by surprise." I murmured.

Damon didn't miss that. He eyed me, and then asked. "Are you feeling well?"

"Yes, I am. Thank you." he gave me one hand, helping me stand up. My legs felt terribly weak after the running and the lack of air. I would have had to watch out for that, next time.

Where were my old jeans and _converses?_

"I thought you had gone downtown with Father and Stefan to meet the Council families" he was suspicious.

Instead of concentrating on a believable excuse, I scanned him from tip to toes.

His clothing was obviously different, and so were the colors he was wearing. Nowhere to be dark and badass-looking. He was in khaki pants and a quite baggy and white shirt, loose on his arms and his sculpted chest. It was so weird to see him in suspenders.

I stood in awe, though, admiring his body that went close to mine. His arms embraced my waist, that felt extremely tiny under his touch.

"God, Miss Katherine!" he hissed, holding me tight as I felt the need to close my eyes and let myself fall on the ground.

Even though he was human, I wasn't expecting he'd manage to hold me that still.

I felt weirdly dizzy and weak, as the world spun around me.

"Damon.." I whispered, then blanked out.

When I opened my eyes the first thing I saw was the white ceiling enlightened by the orange rays of the sunset.

I slowly fixed my gaze and wandered with my sight around the room: a dark-red wall paper covered the whole room, and a fancy and dark-wooden furniture filled the room in its every single space.

Right in front of me stood a quite big writing table and a circled mirror, framed with gold, that reflected the image of my body.

I figured out my hair was curly.

That might have been why Damon had called me Katherine. But wait. No Elena Gilbert existed at the time.

Of course he'd mistaken me for her.

I tried to stretch my legs.

The bed I was in was extremely soft.

I put my hands on the blanket that covered my body, to find out it was silk.

"Miss" a woman came from a tiny door next to the writing desk. "We're glad you wake up".

I felt my jaw dropping when I realized how much she and Bonnie looked alike.

It was Emily Bennett, no doubts on that.

Of course she wouldn't have called me _Katherine_.

I nodded, fearing of what she might have sensed.

"I'm in the Salvatore's mansion, aren't I?" I asked, trying to break the formal silence that had formed.

She eyed me, satisfied of something. Still, I could tell she wasn't bad.

I was only human, after all. Witched protected humans. Didn't they?

"Yes, you are, Miss." Emily stood right where she was for a second, then turned and went to the closet on the right side of my bed. Next to what seemed the entrance door.

A voluminous red dress was drawn from there.

I couldn't actually see it well, because she went to place it on one wooden chair next to the window. It was on my left side.

Emily turned to me, handling me a white cloth. "Mr. Damon Salvatore was very worried about you." She smiled faintly .

"What happened to me?" I questioned.

"The corsets nowadays are getting too tight, Miss. I saw you running from something." Her gaze became suspicious. "_Someone_".

I quickly looked away. "Yes. I thought it was somebody _else_."

Emily nodded, but asked nothing. I was glad to understand where Bonnie had gotten that reserved facet of her character.

"Emily" I called, eyeing that thing in my hands. "What is this?"

She smiled, motherly. "I think I'm going to help you out dressing up for dinner time".

When I got out of my room, I stayed on the doorstep trying to absorb what had just gone on.

The way of dressing in the 1800's was_ beyond_ complicated. So many layers, so much breath to hold.

And then the complicated hair up-do, full with braids and God knew what. Which had taken us away a good hour, I guess.

Now that I was in the big blood-red dress, and had my hair curled, I could have freaked Katherine out.

I just hoped there would have been enough witnesses to prevent my killing.

My heart skipped a bit when his voice called me, from the long corridor of the second floor.

"Miss Katherine"

Yet, it felt so wrong.

I would have had to explain some things.

"I would have come in beforehand, but Emily told me you were resting. Nobody informed me you had woken up". Damon explained.

I smiled, thinking about how many words he was able to put together without either swearing or threatening anybody.

I couldn't help but giggled at the thought of me telling that to the present Damon. I'd have remembered that.

"What is wrong?" his smile enlightened his features. "I'm so happy you're okay".

I leaned in to touch him, but quickly stopped myself before the big mess was done.

He seemed hurt by my abrupt gesture, but soon he had himself back, smiling politely. "Father and Stefan will be downstairs soon" he handed me his arm, waiting for me to take it. "Let me lead you."

I didn't accept the invitation, though.

"What is wrong?" he narrowed his eyes. I was running out of time.

"Mr. Salvatore" I called, feeling it so wrong, as his look was crooked even more. "I'm not Katherine".

He stood there silent for a bunch of seconds, then talked, unbelief in his voice. "What do you mean with that?"

"I mean" I took a deep breath. "That Katherine's actually downtown."

"But.." he couldn't understand, of course.

"My name is Elena." Then how would have he explained the resemblance ? "Elena _Pierce_."

His face grow strong with realization, as I kept on talking. "I'm her lost twin sister."

"Mr. Salvatore" a voice called from between us. We both turned to see one man, who seemed a servant, referring to Damon. "Your father is here in the dinner room. He's waiting for you all to join".

I didn't miss the look of astonishment on the man's face.

And my heart froze.

Surely Katherine was downstairs. He must had see her right before he had seen me.

Damon waited for the servant to be gone to speak. "Katherine had told us all of her family members had died in a fire"

Of course he was suspicious. He was Damon.

In that moment, I regretted that part of him was already alive. "She doesn't know of my existence."

He froze in silent.

"It's _the first_ time we officially meet".

_Good liar, Elena. Congrats. _I sarcastically complimented myself.

It was for a good cause, after all. Wasn't it?

Surely by now Katherine had heard everything.

"Let me guide you downstairs, then" . Damon's eyes went apprehensively on me, as he figured out how tense I was.

I nodded, unable to talk.

In the corner of the eye, I saw Emily staring at me, concern openly shown.

The staircase seemed endless.

When we were almost at the low ground, the figure of a women in a wonderful navy-blue dress standing in the hall caught my attention.

Her hair were the same as mine.

It was her.

The exact moment I realized the big mess I was in, Stefan's eyes met mine. The look of astonishment and unbelief went beyond Damon's and the servant's.

He had his jaw dropped and his face blanked.

The man standing next to him, who I assumed was Giuseppe Salvatore, reflected his son's expression, just with worry in it.

Right then Katherine, who had surely seen the two men's reactions, slowly turned to face us.

Her eyes widened for a second, then pierced mine.


	6. Chapter 6

I hope the waiting wasn't so long.

Anyway, I wanna thank EVERY SINGLE PERSON who's following/reading silently/reviewing constantly my story. Some of you ( writers) know what I mean.

The last part of the chapter is the one I think that came out the best. Smut's quickly going to come between Delena. Next chapter.. Maybe? Oh yes. Just review and motivate me, and you'll see what my brain's able to do! LOL.

Well, love you guys!

I'll shut up and let you read ! Enjoy!

_**The New Guest**_

_Author's POV_

The moment the two doppelganger's eyes met, the thought that obfuscated both girls' minds was one simple word: _danger._

Elena's blood ran cold when Katherine's awareness was quickly shown on her face.

She might have been a vampire with 150 less of experience, still that didn't make her dumb.

The evil vampire pierced her twin's eyes with hatred.

What was she doing here?

It was Katherine's game. Nobody else's.

And something was telling her that the human standing there, holding one of her toys' arm, that she was big trouble.

Still, something in the back of her mind filled her with hope.

The Petrova bloodline hadn't ended up with her daughter.

That meant that her baby girl had grown old enough to have kids.

That her letting go meant the salvation of her only little family member left alive from Klaus.

Katherine shook her head, and Elena cringed slightly in Damon's shoulder.

"What.." Giuseppe began, but was speechless.

"Father" his eldest son introduced, as politeness required, the new guest. "This is Elena"

The couple nullified the distance in the hall, until they were a few feet near the three.

Elena wished Damon's nature was the same of the present days.

She had quickly gotten aware of what his words had meant, when he'd told her he couldn't have protected her there because of him being human.

"My name is Elena Pierce, sir" she hoped that was the right way to introduce herself in the 800's . She did a quick bow but got back to where she was standing when all of the hairs at the base of her neck stood up.

She gave Katherine a swift glance in the corner of her eye, and saw the reflection of the same look she had learned to be afraid of, just well masqueraded.

Stefan exchanged his worried look between the two girls . They were too identical to seem real.

Elena saw that, and understood it was all up to her moves.

It wasn't about Katherine's little games anymore.

This time, she was the real player.

"Father and Mother gave me away when Katherine was still a baby. They couldn't keep me, I guess." She had a real saddened expression when the evil doppelganger's face contracted at the thought of her parents. Elena heart broke, but kept on talking, eyeing the other family members.

She took a deep breath, which Stefan exchanged for misery."I was told my twin was here." She lied."I didn't believe it at first, but now.." she eyed Katherine ,and referred just to her.

"I'm so sorry of what happened to _y_.. our parents."

Silence.

The vampire was fighting against her inner feelings.

And the one that prevailed was deep hatred against this stranger that claimed Katherine's family to be hers.

How dared she?

And now, the young girl was even faking misery for _her_ own loss.

But Katherine wasn't born yesterday. She knew Elena knew something.

That meant she had the upper hand over her.

That was the reason that kept her from killing the human twin in front of the three witnesses.

It was Stefan who broke the silence.

"We are so great that you found yourselves again, misses Pierce. We will be glad to host both of you in our mansion, won't we, Father?" his green eyes were full of hope and determination.

Something that made Elena's stomach twitch in pain, remembering all the hurt this young Salvatore was going to go through, recalling that those two feelings would have been lost 147 years later.

Because of Klaus.

He had tried to take her life away, too. That was why she was doing this in the first place.

She shook her head, determination running through her veins.

"Sure, son." Giuseppe showed a weak smile. "It will be a pleasure to have both of you staying here" .

The man's plans for the future were already filled with high perspectives.

That's what he could see: two beautiful girls, popular for their sad past, hosted by his family made up of only male members.

Two women just as his sons.

Marriage was quickly going to happen, he thought.

Elena smiled faintly "I'm so thankful for your kind invitation, Mr. Salvatore" .

Damon, who had been silent all along, hadn't miss one thing. He could see the way Katherine was tense and alert. "Thank you Mr,Salvatore, for the chance you're giving us to finally meet." The vampire bowed and showed the best smile she could manage in that moment.

"Well." Giuseppe announced, glaring at Damon who had been staring rudely for too long at the new arrival. "Dinner is soon going to be cooked, I guess you ladies would like to take this advantage to reunite yourself for the first time."

Damon was taken aback.

Something in the corner of his mind was screaming at him not to leave Elena alone.

Where did this came from?

Katherine was just her sister!

Meanwhile he was struggling inside, his father called him back to reality.

"Damon" Giuseppe lifted his chin. "Don't be impolite and follow us in the parlor."

_No, don't go! _His mind screamed, just like if it was a person inside of him talking.

Elena seemed to watch and understand his internal struggle.

She leaned in to whisper in his ear, aware that Katherine could have heard everything.

"It's okay, Damon. You can go. I won't be long" she reassured him.

With that, she gave him a weak smile that she hoped would have been persuasive enough to let him go of her.

When the two girls were left alone, fear made Elena's body grow cold.

"Let's take a walk outside,won't we?" Katherine smiled menacing.

Elena simply nodded, leading the way and keeping her glance fixed on the ground.

Katherine didn't explain herself how she could possibly know each inch of the mansion.

"Who are you?" the vampire asked, aware.

"I know who_ you_ are" Elena told back, quickly and suddenly full of confidence. "And you better not mess up with me."

Katherine showed her fangs and with vampire speed piled Elena towards the wall of the backyard.

It surprised her when the young girl didn't freak out nor move.

She made a face and backed off. "I suppose you know what_ I_ _am_, then".

Elena saw her backing off and keeping on walking towards the gardens. "You suppose well." She said back, serious.

"And tell me" Katherine seemed quite amused with the warning Elena had given her. "Why shouldn't I mess up with you?"

After everything-Elena thought- Katherine would have been a dead girl.

When Damon and Stefan would have been turned, they'd have surely fight together against her.

Then there was the real threat that would have likely torn Katherine apart.

"Klaus" she echoed her thoughts, watching as the only thing the young vampire was afraid of made her jump off, startled.

Katherine's face went pale.

"How do you know Klaus?" She had stopped walking.

"Ladies!" somebody called from the porch. Quickly Damon was approaching them. "Father calls you to dinner" his concerned look made it clear that it wasn't Giuseppe who had sent him to them. Elena knew him well.

But somehow, she was glad. She was still some steps ahead of Katherine and hadn't revealed the truth.

That meant if she knew something the vampire didn't, it would have been one of the reasons that would have kept her alive.

Surely Katherine would've never been that stupid to kill somebody who was a resource for her worst enemy's info.

"We'll be there in a minute" the vampire had herself back and stood up properly.

Elena wondered if she'd ever looked even a bunch as charming as her.

"This conversation is not over yet." The first Petrova glared.

Surprisingly , she waited for the human to pace next to her before moving inside.

Dinner was a quiet event, still full with the astonishment of the exact same appearance of the Pierce's from all the Salvatore's .

However, they tried to avoid questions regarding the young girls' past.

Elena had to lie most of the time, pretending that she had been living in a mansion where the old owner, a generous wealthy woman, died just one month before. And she had to leave the house to her sons.

Katherine didn't stop from looking at her, a glimpse of misery whenever shown whenever she dared let her walls down for a couple of seconds. Elena was the closest she had been to her little baby since that night her daughter had been given away.

When the group was over with the dessert, it was still early. Maybe 8 in the evening.

However, Damon and Stefan offered to lead both Elena and Katherine to their rooms for the night.

Elena found out hers was between Damon's and Katherine's and hoped with all of her strength that she wouldn't have witnessed the vampire's night joyrides.

Damon was still holding her arm when they were on the threshold of the bedroom's door.

He eyed furtively his brother, who was doing the same process with Katherine. He wondered why he didn't feel the same jealousy his mind had been filled with until the day before.

"You know I know that something's not alright with you two" he whispered and eyes her sister, as if that would've kept Katherine from eavesdropping. But of course he couldn't know. Not yet.

Elena smiled, bitterly as his blue eyes gazed questioningly. She felt like she owed him an explanation.

"I promise you I'll tell you about it, Damon." she knew it was just a matter of time before Katherine would have explained her little secret. She would have let her do it, in order to follow Bonnie's warning: _"Don't put yourself in the middle of the situation"._

Like if that was easy.

Damon didn't seem convinced, but let it drop. "Whatever you need…" his palm stroked gently the girl's cheek, as she tried not to close her eyes from the relieve that slight contact gave her. "You know where my room is. And that you can talk to me about anything"

Elena decided to play with it a bit. "I'm surprised, Mr. Salvatore. Aren't men supposed to keep their distances from a woman they've known just for a bunch of hours?"

She was being rhetorical , as she knew Damon was different.

"Goodnight Miss Elena" he limited himself to kiss her hand, leaving her in awe.

_In the meanwhile(2011), in Florida._

The sound of the kisses was filling the room, as an astonished Katherine still hadn't realized what was going on.

"Stefan" she murmured between big sighs "What.."

She couldn't talk, since he had placed her on a small wooden desk opposite to the bed and was now stroking the inner part of her tight .

"Shh" he ordered. "Do not talk"

But she couldn't.

As much as the lust was reflecting her deep brown eyes, she couldn't let him in, just for one night.

Hell, she was Katherine Pierce.

What kind of twisted thought was that?

_The ones from somebody who's in love . _her conscience echoed in her mind.

She shook her head in response. "What?" Stefan blurt out, while kissing her collarbone.

"Stefan I'm not going to pretend to be Elena" Katherine managed to say between the moans his hands provoked her.

He backed off, cupping her head in his palms. How could she think that he was going to have sex with her pretending her to be somebody else? "Is that why you think I'm doing this?"

She looked away, smirking bitterly. "I just know that".

He hissed something between his teeth . "Katherine" he told off.

The girl's stomach cringed in a weird it had never done in centuries at the sound of her name coming out from his lips.

She locked her gaze into his, seeking for what she was sure she'd have never found .

"For absurd it might sound, through all the mess I've gone through, you're the one who's been here to save me. All the times." He explained, his green eyes were not reflecting sarcasm or anger like they had been doing latterly . "It's you who saved my life in 1864. If it hadn't been for _you_, I'd have been buried down. It's you the one who tried to make me feel something now that Klaus has taken everything from me, even though I know how much it's costing you. You didn't want to feel anything, because you claimed you did not care."

He shook his head. "But if you're doing this now," he pointed at her trembling body " it means you've been lying for so long."

Had she had just imagined the guilt in his voice?

"Why are you saying this?" her voice was low in unbelief.

"Because I couldn't feel anything when I saw the girl I thought I loved laying down on the ground, just been raped and humiliated ." Katherine jumped off at the memory of Elena. " I couldn't feel anything when I took her blood away, when I regretted my brother's help." He was even more bitter now, a thread of anger slightly touched his voice. "But then what you said that night.. About your feelings, made me realize how wrong I had been when I had been hating what Damon had done to me all over those years."

She narrowed her eyebrows.

" He was suffering because he knew you loved me." He explained " And I blamed you for your feelings." He shook his head and looked away.

Katherine rushed to touch his cheek , making him turn to her. "Talk, Stefan" she encouraged him.

"If I had openly said what I felt for you, no one would have been hurt. We could have left Mystic Falls and let the others rest in peace. Instead, I wasn't a man and kept everything inside of me. " he opened his mouth to take a deep breath, his eyes going full with water. "I want to love you again, Katherine".


	7. Chapter 7

_Oh,well!_

_I know I should have updated before, but I've had an hard week with school and homework. I have this evening off, and I'm finally free to write as much as I desire. So I figured I should post this chapter ( a little short, but needed to be cut just where it is now ) and go ahead with the story. So if I have another tough week, I have all the chapters ready. I think I'm going to upload every 3 days, to give everyone the chance to read !_

ENJOY!

_**AND REVIEW!**_

_**Confessions**_

_Author's POV _

What Elena heard that night was nothing to be surprised of. Yet, it made her feel so uncomfortable and awkward. Surely it wasn't going to help her drifting to sleep.

Her laugh- Katherine's laugh- echoed in the complete silent hall, then it all went hush. In that exact moment, the human was aware of what was going on in the room right next to hers.

Then a deaf thump in the mutual wall opposite to her bed, her doppelganger's room.

And she knew exactly what was going on.

Elena closed her eyes and pulled a pillow over her face ,hoping with all herself the man making company to the vampire wasn't _her_ Damon.

The chirping of the birds and the rays flirting from the big window of the room woke her up the next early morning.

She figured out she had no idea of what she was going to do. She stayed in her bed for a couple of minutes, trying to slow down the pace of her speeding heart, having no explanation of that kind of reaction.

_Calm yourself down, Elena_! Her own mind told off.

Right while her internal struggle, Emily came into her room.

"Good Morning Miss Elena" she smiled. "I figured you'd wake up this early. The curtains should have been brought down" the young human didn't buy the excuse. Surely the witch had sensed her tension.

Elena gained her time to process the woman in front of her being a witch. "Yes, I should remember that tonight"

Emily took her by surprise by sitting next to her. The powerful woman could feel there was something the young girl was hiding, and could sense the pressure and the feeling of loss Elena had inside.

"What is your story, Miss?" she asked sincerely and suddenly.

Elena downed her eyes, fearing to reveal her secret, yet in a big need to talk to somebody who understood her.

"I shouldn't tell you about it" she confessed.

"Who told you so?" Emily was concerned about maybe somebody threatening this kind human doppelganger.

"Your grand-who knows how many times-daughter, Bonnie Bennett" she explained, watching as the witch's expression shifted from concern to astonishment.

"I don't have any child. Neither.." she stopped suddenly. "Oh Lord" Emily then murmured, headed towards the small room communicating with Elena's and coming back shortly after with what looked like an old book in her hands.

The witch started flip through the pages of the grimoire Elena knew well from her best friend's spells and stopped suddenly.

"Time travelling" Emily murmured in unbelief. "I can't believe she is really this powerful"

Elena couldn't help but warn the witch. "Please don't tell Katherine" she begged. "She'll kill me. The whole history will be changed and.."

Emily interrupted her. "I surely won't, Miss Elena." She took a deep breath, brushing slightly her fingers through the pages for some seconds. "This is one of the most powerful and complicated spells a witch can cast. If when you stay here, you change something… God knows what could happen next." She was silent for a minute. "But why? What's so important to come back from…?"

"2011" Elena murmured attentive. She didn't miss how pale Emily got. "I'm here because of Klaus. He ruined my life, Damon's and everybody else's. I'm just trying to get it back." She explained, anger rushing through her voice. "Please don't be mad" she begged, then.

Emily wisely caught the regret in the human's voice and couldn't help but worry of what the future might have reserved. She wasn't surprised, though ,at the mentioning of the Original. "You need to be entirely honest with me, Miss. What happened?"

Elena opened her mouth to say something, but in a swift move Emily gestured her to stay silent.

"I'll go get your tea, Miss Elena" she stood up and headed out.

Of course it was Katherine .

Elena had her tea and was helped getting dressed.

Giuseppe had some servants make a dress just for her, it was in all the shades of blue and in the finest silk material. There was the lack of mischief in Elena's voice that had started her boyfriend's father grow fond of her the moment she had begun to talk at the dinner the night before.

When Elena got downstairs, she obviously met him.

"Good Morning, Mr. Salvatore" Elena smiled at Damon, and a hint of sadness was heard in her voice.

Hell, if she missed kissing him, feeling him touching her and holding him close.

"Good Morning, Elena" he couldn't help but smile back. "Please" his expression was now showing the smirk that made her heart skip a beat. "Call me Damon".

"Fine, Damon" she pronounced his name enjoying what he couldn't know.

"Would you mind having your breakfast with me?" he demanded, sure of himself.

"It would be nice, thank you" she bowed and kept herself from jumping on him and kissing those soft lips as he leaded her to the dining room.

"Where are the others?" Elena was curious she hadn't still Katherine around trying to steal Damon for herself.

"Father has gone downtown at dawn and took Stefan with him" he smiled bitterly, trying to hide regret.

"What about Katherine?" she asked, sure she was still in town.

"She said she was going out with a certain Mrs. Pearl."

Elena narrowed her eyebrows, and quickly tried to avoid the subject. There was too much temptation in her that pushed her to the road of the truth. "You know It's not true your father prefers Stefan, don't you?"

She had promised herself she would have helped Damon with his troubles as much as she could not to mess up with the future. And she was aware his denied love had been the cause of many problems.

If she couldn't solve it, at least she'd have tried to ease the pain.

Damon was taken aback. How could she ever got to the point without knowing him?

"You're a good observer, aren't you?" was his sarcastic answer.

Elena stared at the ground. "You can't even imagine".

That was enough to drive him crazy to know everything about the mysterious girl right next to him.

The more she talked, the more he was drawn to her.

"Tell me more about you three" Elena asked, urgent.

He couldn't explain why, but there was misery in her voice. That's why he answered her quickly and honest.

"Since mother died, father's been seeing in Stefan what she used to be. My little brother is so like her: his appearance, his doing.." he shook his head, saddened at the memory "I, instead, am the headstrong and thankless elder son. Everything I do, it seems like I keep on disappointing him. By now, I should have got married, and should be trying to have children" he luckily missed how Elena froze when he had said that magic word. " Instead" he pointed at his figure. "Here I am".

There had always been misery in Damon's life. She had never gotten the chance to talk about his past in 2011-except for the various conversations about Katherine-but she could understand how it felt like to be rejected from your own parents. And how incomplete that could leave you, along with the loss of your own mother.

"I understand" her voice trembled, and brought him to stare deeply in her chocolate brown depths. "I do, Damon. And believe me.." she brushed her hand on his arm, resting it there. "You won't be sad forever"

There was so much she wanted to tell him, so much she wanted to confess.

But she couldn't.

It was for his own sake.

_Florida, 2011._

Katherine was still asleep in his arms.

They had kept themselves from having it. Although she would have loved the fact of Stefan making love to her, she just couldn't give in.

Was she starting to love that man all over again?

Maybe.

He was keeping her on his chest, stroking gently her curls. He didn't know why he was doing that.

He was simply aware of the fact that it made him feel something that gave him a glimpse of hope. And the longer it passed, the more that unknown sensation came to the surface.

He couldn't name it, but there was still something that moved his stomach enough to make him feel.

Katherine took a deep breath as she slowly woke up.

"I'm glad you didn't run while I was alseep" she greeted.

Stefan nodded, hiding his face in her hair and smelling the unique scent. "I'm not _that kind of person_" .

The obvious remark made her smirk bitterly.

"It was a long time ago."

"True" he said back.

Yet, he could remember the first time she got down the carriage, the first days of Katherine's arrival to his Father's mansion. He could swear he had seen something true in her, that something that had him falling inevitably in love with her.

And Katherine, how could she forget the night he opened up to her, confessing his love? That was the moment where the nature of her had held her back from spending the life with her lover.

Suddenly both vampires froze in shock.

"What the hell was that, one of your tricks?" Stefan hissed, venom in his voice.

Katherine wasn't sure what he was talking about, plus she was pretty confused with what her mind had just shown her.

"Are you fucking kidding me, Stefan?" she turned to face him, releasing from his almost hug.

Her eyes inspected his, only to find insecurity and more shock.

Something was telling her it wasn't Stefan to give her that vision.

"Something is off" Stefan muttered under his breath.

She blocked his wrist ,forcing his gaze to be locked into hers. "Did you see something?"

Stefan nodded, thought about it for a second, then explained. "I was thinking about 1864, when you first arrived."

Katherine was taken aback at the fact of his train of thoughts going along with hers. "Then?" she kept her tone low.

"I saw Elena" Stefan stated, unbelief in his voice.

She froze, realizing it was the same thing she had seen.


	8. Chapter 8

_Gosh. _

_I know I should have put the smut in this one, but there were a few things that needed to be written before. _

_I'm going to start to work on the next chapter, where a lot of thing are going to happen._

_Please forgive me? _

_If you get me motivated with your reviews, in two days you'll have your chap!_

_Question : If Elena succeeds to have the child.. Will it be a girl or a boy? ( let's see if you guess well! :3 )_

"What was it,Stefan?" Katherine asked,aware.

Stefan stayed stilent,still processing what he had visualized. "I saw her in 1864".

Katherine didn't need any more explanations,because it was exactly what she had seen,too.

"What the hell's she up to?" the female vampire muttered to herself under her breath.

"It must be some kind of witch trick playing with our minds" Stefan stated even if the doppelganger was being rhetorical. Katherine narrowed her eyes realizing how malicious the young Salvatore had become after Klaus' mess.

No need to say that it attracted her to him even more.

"We need to get back" she stated all of a sudden,standing up and heading towards the bathroom. Whatever those visions meant, they were beyond a pure and weird coincidence. Both her and Stefan had seen Elena in 1864.

"Weren't you supposed to save me from the evil inside of me?"Stefan asked sarcastic, pulling Katherine back to Earth. She couldn't help but glare. "Consider that a favor I was willing to give you. By now it's gone" she gave him a fake smile and leaned over the doorway.

Of course she was lying. Surely Stefan would have never known that.

But she wasn't going to leave his side.

Not after all the years she had spent apart from him.

It had come the right time to put her feelings of selfishness aside in order to make enough room for her love for Stefan.

"I'm not willing to go back to that gloomy town" the man in front of her pouted.

"And said from you, the king of happiness…" Katherine teased. "I'm going to shower" she announced,after a brief pause. "Wanna join?" her eyes lit up along with her evil smirk.

What made Katherine froze was Stefan's sudden mischievous smirk.

She let her jaw drop when he didn't seem to push the offer back to the sender.

The young man blurred in front of her, his face a few inches from hers.

Katherine tried with all her strength to understand what was going on behind those green depths,afraid of what she might have seen.

Still,her love for him was too much to step back from, but enough to give her hopes that his dark glance meant what she had spent her last 147 years whishing for.

When he saw something in her dark sparkling eyes, he approached. They seemed teary, yet she wasn't speaking to confirm her hatred towards him. He wasn't sure of what Katherine was thinking in that moment.

Little did he know of what she wanted, too.

He took one step forward, hoping that his idea would have suited the woman in front of her.

"Please,Stefan" Katherine begged, her voice lacked in some points of the sentence.

She was afraid. Afraid of what she might have become after the upcoming nightstand with him.

She knew he was going to enjoy some hours with her, to go back to be the evil ripper he had become shortly after.

Katherine knew he was doing that just for fun.

The older her, Instead, suggested that she should have put her selfishness aside. That she should have offered herself to prove Stefan's humanity.

If he could have been able to feel something with her, maybe there would have been a glimpse of hope.

It was so hard to choose, but eventually she did.

"What,Katherine?" he whispered in a crook tone. "You proposed this"

Her words came out before she could stop them . "Forget it"

She cursed inside. She had been a bitch for too long, and the lies came out so easily she felt pity for herself.

And disgust.

Stefan saw her gaze being fixed on the ground as her words left her mouth, and knew that she was lying.

He blurred next to her, lifting her chin so close to his face.

Her smell brought back too many memories.

They had made it so difficult, when it could have been so simple.

"Do you love me?" he demanded, all of a sudden.

He became aware. He knew that she did, as he knew that he had underestimated Katherine.

_When it's real, you can't walk away_ … His best friend's words echoed in his mind.

Katherine gulped some air, shaking slightly her head.

"I've loved you since the days of our first encounter. You've been the one since then"

She had always been so able with her words. And there she was now, struggling to keep her breath stable.

Stefan nodded, in a piercing silence.

"I've spent my last 147 years loving you,Stefan." She fought against the threat of emotions inside of her wanting to blurt out. "You may not return that. " she fixed her gaze into his, honest as never before. "But I need you to believe me".

It was enough for him.

Enough for an invisible strength to pull his lips against the softness of hers, erasing the willing to stop.

Then it all became clear.

It hadn't been Elena Gilbert the woman he was once in love with.

It wasn't her the reason why he had come back in Mystic Falls to save the human from the car accident,to stalk her for months.

He had been seeking for the memory of the girl in front of him in her perfect human duplicate.

That was why, in the first place, he had thought his gloomy life meant something when he first kissed Elena Gilbert, when he slept with her.

He had cared about her, sure. He had chosen to feel in every possible way and considered her something more than just a friend.

His first love,t hough,could have never been a comparison worth to any other.

Why,then,had he felt something with Elena he had never felt with any other girl before?

Because on the back of his mind, it was Katherine Pierce.

It had been her all along.

_Mystic Falls,1864_

Damon had been waiting for Elena to come down from her room after her morning tea. He was now pacing back and forth in the foy.

"Good morning,Damon. Waiting for someone?"

If it wouldn't have been for the mischievousness in the female's voice, he'd traded Katherine for Elena.

It was a good thing the twins weren't so much alike,deep down.

When the young man turned,he saw Katherine standing a few feet from him in her wonderful creamy dress, that enhanced the olive tone of her flawless skin.

"The founder's ball is tomorrow night. I'm still unsure on who to choose for me to be my chaperone." She smiled , implying something Damon quickly catched.

He knew she wasn't good.

Still,that seemed to stimulate some kind of interest for the beautiful woman.

He loved the danger.

"Will you walk with me through the gardens to discuss about the upcoming night?"

Damon smiled,thinking about how skillful she was to manipulate her own sentences, in order not to be blamed for her opened allusions to sex in public. According to the law of the times, she could have been strictly punished.

But Katherine was smart. He couldn't know how much.

Elena had just gotten over her tea – she had been told from Emily that they used to have it as an anticipation for a big breakfast- although she had her stomach already full with butterflies.

While Emily was adding some last touches to the doppelganger's complicated updo, Elena commented. "You don't have to do this", a bit embarrassed from all the attentions she was being given.

"Mr. Giuseppe Salvatore's been seeking out for a servant to give to you." The witch explained,smiling."I offered myself,as we two needed to clear things out. Plus, you're way beyond educated than Miss Katherine."

Elena couldn't help but smirk,then she asked serious as she fixed her gaze into the mirror,staring at her figure"Why do you serve her?"

Emily sighed, following her glance. "Do I have a choice? I saved her life once. And next to her is the safest place a witch could have." She stepped back,her work was over. "I guess you have an idea of how powerful Katherine Pierce is".

Elena simply nodded. She tilted her head to the side when she saw Emily smiling. "I think there's someone out that door waiting for you".

Elena literally threw herself to the door, wanting nothing more than seeing his face again.

Disappointment was quickly replaced with fear.

Stefan stood right in front of her, an embarrassed smile crossed his lips.

"Good Morning, Miss Elena"

The girl tried to slow down the pace of her heart, shouting in her own mind that it wasn't Stefan the ripper.

It was just the innocent and harmless human Stefan.

"Good Morning, " she greeted,but couldn't smile.

"I'm sorry to bother you,but I saw my brother and your sister walking in the gardens. She told me to deliver you a message".

The monotonousness in his voice, the flat tone that it had switched something on in Elena's mind.

He was under compulsion.

"What message?" her voice didn't lack confidence. She had been through a lot.

"She said she'll be glad to play this game with one more player" the voice of her future ex boyfriend made her heart froze in terror.

In the meanwhile- Florida, 2011

"Stefan" Katherine chocked when she felt his hands brushing her back slowly.

"You need to show me you care." He whispered. "If you really care, if you really love me. Then you'll be woman enough to tell me now if what you said before was a lie".

"I wasn't lying, Stefan" she hissed,giving her back to him, determinate to leave.

One finger went unconsciously on her lips, goose bumps invaded her body .

Then she froze, when his hands wrapped around her tiny waist.

"I'm sorry"his voice echoed in her ear, growing her cold.

Katherine turned slowly to face him.

"For what?"

He needed to say those words. He had to try.

If he wouldn't have felt anything, then fine. He had at least tried.

Stefan knew it was the right thing to do.

"That we hurt each other, when it had always been you, for me. But I guess I'm a damned soul." He smirked bitterly, then explained " Now that I figure out who I really loved, I can't feel it."

She tried to calm down, she really did.

This was beyond any expectation she had ever had.

If it could have been possible, her heart was by now bursting alive in her chest. After 500 years of misery.

Her whole body was trembling when she answered. She struggled to keep her voice steady,failing. "You can feel, Stefan. I know you can. " she brushed his cheek with the tip of her fingers. "The old Stefan would have done it, for me. "

"I can't " his voice was trembling aswell.

She nodded, slowly. "This is going to kill me"

Stefan eyed her warning, still he couldn't understand what she meant.

"What…" he began, but she cut him off.

"I'll show you how to feel, Stefan. Whatever it will be , I won't have any regret. " her eyes grew with tears. "This is our last chance".

_**Reviews are love!**_


	9. Chapter 9

_SMUUT. Yeah, finally, uh? xD _

_Seriously, I wrote this after I studied 3 chapters of geography for tomorrow's test. So I hope it's readable. I have this other new story in mind._

_**What if you-yes you who's reading this right now!- could suddenly be in The Vampire Diaries' world and live with Elena, Damon, Stefan and the others? **_

_**Consider this an experiment.**_

_**I'm going to write a fanfiction about this. It's basically me ( who could be you ) living with them after the 3x11 . You could be Elena's best friend, the one to tell her not to give up, to let Damon in… And Damon's best confident: the one to be there to hold him when he feels like the love of his life will never want him, when he'll feel like he's lost his brother…**_

_So you got the picture, haven't you? _

**TELL ME WHAT YA THINK!AND REVIEW!**

_**Secrets don't last long**_

_Mystic Falls, 1864_

"May I lead you downstairs?" Stefan was back to his normal tone right after she gave him her consent.

"So I saw you're pretty fond of my sister" Elena stated, looking around the magnificent house. There were pieces of furniture still present in 2011.

Stefan contained an embarrassed laugh. "She's intriguing . But she'll never choose me"

Elena fought not to froze in pain at his words.

"That's not true" she tried to keep her breath even, staring in his eyes. "She'll love you, in her ways. She always does, although she may not seem to care."

There was a part inside of her that hated the old Katherine, but the other –the most dominant – felt the need to protect her.

Because Katherine had been hurt, and Elena was the only one who knew it.

Stefan seemed tranquillized by her words. "Thank you. But how do you know, if you've never met her before…?"

_Shit_. Elena cursed in her mind.

"I.. uhm. I feel it. Sisterly bond, you know?" she casually looked away.

Katherine was keeping an eye on her human doppelganger, and of course didn't miss the conversation Elena had with Stefan while she was sitting on the breakfast table outside with Damon.

She waited for them to approach, watching Elena cringe in Stefan's arm.

Damon hated every second of it.

"Well, Good morning , Elena" Katherine greeted with a smirk.

Damon, instead, didn't say anything.

Elena didn't miss that, and of course knew what it was about. "Good morning, Katherine" she lifted her chin a bit, cold and detached. Then she warmed up her voice when she spoke to Damon. "Good morning, Damon."

"Please" Stefan said "Have a seat." And he pointed an empty seat between him and his brother.

How ridiculous destiny could be. Faith wanted the table to be round, so the two ladies were between the two gorgeous men.

"So" Katherine began, while taking a piece of cake. "I am truly excited" and smiled.

"Really? And why is that?" Elena answered, sarcastic, as Damon raised an eyebrow . He quickly understood the tone in the girls' voice. He knew it was faked friendly .

"Because the Founder's Day's tomorrow. The Salvatores are the.."

"ones of the founding families" Elena cut off, annoyed by Katherine's attitude. And cursed again under her breath. It was twice in some minutes she was failing.

Katherine quickly composed her expression of astonishment. And was aware Elena wasn't a normal human doppelganger.

"I know because you told me that yesterday,_ sister_" Elena fixed her mistake, enjoying how Katherine crooked her face when she pointed out their grade of relation.

"Anyway." Katherine ignored her last statement. "We're going shopping downtown today. Will you keep me company?"

The human knew there was no way out. "Yes, I'll be glad" she faked a smile.

Damon didn't miss it. He actually had his gaze fixed on Elena the whole time, since her arrival. He had learnt to understand her in a few hours, as if he'd known her for a lifetime. That was weirdly warming.

"So" he caught everybody's attention. "Speaking of the Ball." A brief pause. "Me and my younger brother talked about us being your chaperones, if you ladies don't mind."

Stefan continued the conversation . "Katherine, will you go there with me?" he eyed Elena, mentally thanking her for the advice. She – on the other hand- felt anger. Because she knew that as much as Stefan had hurt her in the past, or better, in the future, _but whatever_…This was just the way things were meant to be. Katherine had to hurt Stefan and Damon. She had her task to be completed, and Elena couldn't get in the way more than she already was.

"Of course I will, Stefan" she giggled satisfied.

This whole story made her stomach close, feeling the well known sense of disgust towards food.

_Not again!_ Her mind pleaded.

Damon saw Elena lower her gaze and leave the plate half full.

"Elena." He called her. When her deep brown eyes met his, he caught something that made the air stop in his lungs. She was hiding something that was making her miserable, and he couldn't help but feel a weird feeling grow inside of him. "Would you like me to be your chaperone to the Ball?"

Her eyes were enlightened as she smiled softly. "Yes. I would love to."

Breakfast was a slow and fulfilling event. Elena felt bloated, on the edge of exploding.

"If you'll excuse me" she stood up "I'd need to use the toilet".

Damon followed her with his eyes until she disappeared in the mansion.

Elena headed towards the service bathroom at the ground storey, locking herself in and kneeling down on the cold pavement next to the toilet.

Damon- from the present days in 2011-had been trying so hard to help her get rid of her eating disorder. It was something that had developed when she felt alone, when nobody was there to keep her in pieces.

Now this Damon, the one in the dark about the future, of course still didn't love her. Of course didn't know the pain that had been filling the girl's life.

She needed the man that knew her more than anything else. She was strong, but couldn't handle it all on her own.

Two fingers went with experience and a flawless move in her throat, rendering hard to breathe and easy to puke the soul out of her.

Katherine heard it all.

Her brows narrowed, staring at a blank point.

"Is everything okay?" Stefan asked tenderly, resting one hand on hers.

" You should go check on Elena" the vampire referred to Damon,in a steady voice.

She couldn't explain her doing, but as much as she'd wanted the bitch dead.. Something in the corner of her mind didn't think it like that.

It was as if an unknown and unnamed feeling, or force, pushed Katherine to care.

She shook her head, trying to shut the feelings off.

Damon stood in the foy, listening for some kind of noise.

"Where did Miss Pierce go?" he asked one servant, who looked around and then pointed at the bathroom. "I saw her headed to the servant's bathroom. I don't know if she's still there, though, Mr. Salvatore"

He walked there swiftly, sensing something was off.

"Elena?" he called, and heard a faint thump as answer. Then the sound of someone coughing, like a choke.

"May I come in?"

No answer.

"Elena, open this door. You're concerning me!"

Still no answer.

Damon took the decision unconsciously.

He stepped backward and then hit hard his shoulder on the door, bursting it open.

When he saw the girl on the floor, his heart froze.

_Florida, Present Days._

The kiss grew hotter and hotter, until none of the two could breathe.

They didn't need to, luckily.

"Katherine" Stefan murmured when she kissed his sculptured biceps .

"This is how it should have end the last time, Stefan. " she bravely launched herself in a passionate kiss, again.

"This is how we're going to start all over again" Katherine whispered then in his ear.

He took her by her wrists in his strong hold and threw her on the bed, tearing her clothes off.

He stopped for a while, fixing his gaze into hers. Her brown depths were glowing with lust and victory. And an emotion he couldn't name.

"You're so beautiful" he admitted, caressing slowly her cheek. She closed her eyes at the touch.

" I need you to be into me" she begged, her voice shaky.

He freed himself of the jeans, as she watched him in pure awe.

When his member was brushing her entrance, she grabbed it in her small palm and began stroking its length from up to down, alternating slow and swift motions.

He growled in pleasure, resting his head on the hole of her collarbone.

His breath fastened, as her hand played in an expert way with his hardened member. With her other hand, Katherine grabbed some locks of hair from the lower part of his neck and forced him to look at her.

She meant for some erotic words to come out. She was so good in that.

Then why the only sentence that filled her mind was composed of three, dangerous words?

He kissed her, his tongue exploring her mouth wanting to rip the soul out of her.

Katherine moved her hand from his dick before he'd come.

He growled again, this time unsatisfied. "Tit for tat"

His kisses went down from her flat stomach to the most sensible nerves of her body.

She moaned as soon as his lips brushed hers.

"Stefan" she whispered.

He, as an answer, rubbed again his tongue on her clit, playing around.

Katherine's hold tightened on his hair, pressing him closer as three fingers went completely inside of her.

She screamed in a welcomed pain.

Stefan started to brush her inner walls hardly and hardly, while his tongue sucked on her nerve, swallowing her juices. The sound of her moans became more frequent in a very short time, right when she was about to near her orgasm, he pulled out.

"Fuck that, Stefan" she hissed.

Katherine rested her head that had been tensed up and looked between the valley of her breasts to see him smirking and licking his lips.

That only made her arousal increase.

He didn't miss the smell, and decided to play it nice. If that was how it could have been called.

Stefan's tongue was stuck inside of her, as one long scream of pleasure broke the quiet of the room.

Surely the whole storey could have heard them… But they both didn't care.

It was just him. Just her.

Finally almost reunited.

"Yes.." she murmured, grabbing as much blanket in her palms as she could. She didn't mind breaking the material. She'd have really been disappointed, instead, to ruin Stefan's perfect hair.

"Oh my God" Katherine whispered again.

When she locked her gaze on Stefan, watching his head buried down between her tights, she reached her climax.

She screamed his name with every thrust his tongue gave.

Her back arched visibly as she locked her fingers in the locks of his hair.

Stefan pleaded her until she came down her orgasm.

Katherine rested on the blankets. Her eyes were swollen, her lips parted.

He stood there in awe, admiring the beautiful vision.

When he couldn't take any more of that, he neared his member to her entrance, stroking gently her clit.

She widened her eyes when his length was pulled abruptly in her.

"Stefan!" she screamed, but he covered her lips with his, kissing her tenderly.

Maybe Katherine had been right, again.

Maybe the small glimpse of light inside of him was warming up along with his feelings.

The need to be inside of her, of hearing her come for him… The knowledge of her wanting him inside of her body… Awoke something in Stefan.

"I love you,Katherine"

_**This whole Mystic Falls thing will last just a few more chapters… Then.. You'll see!**_


	10. Chapter 10

_What do I see at the horizon? Threesome? Who knows?_

_Okay , enough said._

_Just enjoy! I'm so glad of the feedbacks I got on my last chapter, hope this is what you guys might want to read!_

_Love ya!_

_**You can't play with me, Katherine**_

_Author's POV_

Damon's lungs ached, desperately seeking fresh air.

He picked Elena up in his arms, slapping slightly her paled cheek.

"Please, wake up!" he begged, in panic when he figured out she wasn't responding back.

"For God's sake, Elena!" he screamed, but he didn't notice.

He rested his fingers on her neck, sensing the pulse was slowing down with each beat.

"Somebody help!" he called out, feeling helpless as he watched the beautiful woman laying unconscious in his arms .

Katherine popped out from Damon's back, startling him .

He was too concerned to argue about the young woman not showing even the slightest emotion.

"Your sister is dying. Go get a nurse!"

The blood froze in his veins when Katherine smirked amused.

"Move" she demanded, annoyed .

"She's dying, Katherine! Go get a fucking nurse!" Damon screamed in panic.

Katherine approached them, removing Elena from his arms as he hold tight her hands.

Damon could not name the emotions that charged his body, neither he could understand what was going on when Katherine bit her inner wrist and swiftly brushed it on her sister's lips.

"What.. what are you doing?"

She didn't answer.

Instead, she lifted Elena's chin and grinned satisfied when the girl began to sink in.

Elena's cheeks slowly reddened and some minutes later she was going back to her olive skin tone.

"How did you do that?" Damon's voice trembled at the sight of the event, backing of, leaving the two sisters as far as he could manage in the small service room.

Katherine let Elena on the floor and approached the young, scared-to-death man.

"You will not run away. You will not be afraid nor tell anyone" .

"I won't do that" compulsion worked perfectly, as the vampire's face pouted .

"It was slightly different than how I planned, but.." she shrugged "Whatever. Now you know".

Damon felt the need of running out for his own survival, of leaving this damned town and be safe. Yet he could not. And he couldn't remember the reason. "What are you?"

Katherine grinned mischievously "I'm a vampire".

"No.." he shook his head. "It can't be."

Again, the girl giggled. "I suppose you should process the fact before even state that" .

Damon's gaze met Elena's, who was not shocked, neither seemed to be taken aback.

"You knew?" he asked, feeling betrayal.

She just nodded, as Katherine turned to her and pinned her to the wall, showing her glistering fangs.

"Now that you're healed with blood in my system it won't be hard to threaten you into telling me the truth".

Damon took a few steps ahead, wanting to set the girl free. But his conscious screamed at him that little he could do.

Elena was still a bit dizzy from the faint, but was alert Katherine's threads were real.

She was so well aware that that Katherine wasn't kidding when she menaced to turn her into a vampire. After all, it was the same she-vampire that had turned Stefan and Damon that year.

"Put me down." She coughed "And you'll know."

Elena met Damon's troubled gaze again, then hers went on Katherine.

"Will you leave me and my sister alone, Damon?" Katherine understood her doppelganger's unspoken question, and lead the two girls outside.

"Let's continue our last conversation, Elena, shall we?" the girl asked smiling darkly.

Elena glared, sincerely pissed off at the fact that she had Katherine's blood in her system. Obviously, the vampire had figured out that if she couldn't threaten the girl with death menaces, she'd freak her out with the whole turning into a vampire fact.

"Katherine, I know you're not like that". Elena stated, serious.

The vampire raised one eyebrow and demanded cocky. "Excuse me?"

Elena ignored Katherine's attitude. "I know the reason why you are who you are today. You need to know that I'm sorry that you had to suffer so much. And that Klaus will die, someday. I know that".

The girl shivered, memories vividly floating in her mind. Katherine seemed taken aback. The mentioning of Klaus only made her grew with concert about her own safety.

"What do you know about him?" her tone was suspicious and alert, her expression crooked when the girl in front of her began to speak.

"A lot. More than you could ever know. And I can't talk about it." She met her gaze, trying to beg her not to ask more questions.

"How do you know he will die?" Katherine thought it was some kind of trick played by one of the mass that wanted her dead.

"For the same reason why I can't talk about it. Things need to go ahead as if I weren't here, Katherine. Because I shouldn't be where I am now. And it's important from you not to ask me any more question."

Katherine grinned cocky."Wrong answer. I ask as many question as…"

"Stop." Elena interrupted her, starting to get even more pissed off at her attitude. How could Stefan and Damon be so blind to trust her ? "Whatever I say, whatever you want me to tell you, it's only going to be something that will turn against you in the end. You must know nothing, that's the only chance you have for it to work."

Katherine stared at her in silence for a couple of seconds.

"And mostly." Elena wanted to grin for how manipulative she could be in this. "You must not kill me, let alone turn me. It will mess up the succession of things."

Katherine sort the statement out, then answered mischievously.

"Fine. Play your games. But know that by now you're a part of mine, too."

And with that she left.

Elena got back to her room until lunch, which she was able to skip with the excuse of her feeling sick.

Emily had questioned her many times about her conversation with Katherine, but she told her nothing had slipped out of her mouth.

A couple of hours after noon somebody knocked on Elena's bedroom door.

"Come in" she ordered, standing slowly on her feet. She still hadn't gotten used to corsets.

Damon was standing on the doorstep, a concerned look narrowed his dark eyebrows. His eyes were looking for nothing but the truth.

"You need to tell me.." he whispered, approaching. Elena braced herself with the whole vampire talk. "Why were you on the floor when I burst in the door?"

She froze, clinching her fists between the delicate silk of her light green dress, staring at the wooden floor.

This, out of all the things she was prepared to face, was even worse.

"I felt sick" she lied, hanging on to the only hope that the present Damon knew the truth. She hoped he'd forgive her.

Immediately his hand brushed hers, resting still there. "I know it's a lie."

She raised her chin to him, something he'd noticed she'd do whenever she felt challenged.

"And how would you say such a thing?" she asked, as if he had just insinuated she was a liar.

"Because something inside of me tells me it's not the truth." He shook his head, confused. "Ever since you've come here, I feel different. I .." he leaned in, stopping a few inches from her face.

He needed to touch her, to feel her in every possible way.

He didn't know why, but Elena felt like home.

She didn't hesitate like a normal lady from the 19th century would have done in front of a stranger.

To her, and to his complete unbeknown, Damon was her entire life.

It was Elena who broke the gap between them, starting the contact with his lips.

She was kissing him, and didn't feel any difference.

It felt like 2011 again. Especially when he put his tongue into her mouth and began to play around with hers. They broke apart to fill their lungs, as Elena smiled when she figured out they were on the same level, they were both human.

Damon's hands went around her face, her neck, her hair, messing up the fancy up-do Elena had spent so long putting on.

But she didn't care.

All she wanted was unite with him, like they used to. To have him into her. To feel that connection that risked her heart to shatter in invisible pieces, risking her body to explode with love.

"I need you, Damon" she whispered in the crook of his neck, as her hands went on the zip of his pantaloons.

"Elena.." he begged, but he actually wasn't sure of his own words.

"Let me .." she whispered, kissing his collarbone. " I want to be yours"

_Mystic Falls, Present Days._

A knock on the door made Damon jump off from his thoughts.

He stood there on the couch of the parlor , relieving every new memory Elena was molding.

Bonnie quickly got to the doorstep, lifting her shoulders and raising her chin in a menacing tone when she saw Katherine holding hands with Stefan.

The she- vampire quickly untangled it, giggling.

Then she became serious. "So. Who's messing up with our minds?"

"That'd be me" Bonnie was challenging. "And Elena" she said, as she eyed Stefan in a disgusted and betrayed expression.

"Damon's so right to call you judgy." Katherine pouted, not missing the silent exchange, and stepped in, followed by the younger Salvatore.

"We're deep in thoughts. Wonderin' which one of you is enjoying her right now?" Katherine lifted one eyebrow, staring at Damon, who hadn't moved an inch from her appearance.

"I guess I just got it" she smirked, mischievously .

Damon muttered a "Shut up", which the vampire ignored. "Speaking of Elena..Where's she?"

"To the place where you exactly see her" Bonnie's voice echoed solemn. "I did the spell. Her body's upstairs."

Katherine studied her expression, figuring out she was being true. Plus, that was the only explanation to all the visions they three had been having in the last two days.

"Why would she go back to Mystic Falls in 1864?"

Bonnie grinned satisfied, as Katherine's anger of being in the dark of something grow visibly.

"What?" the she-vampire demanded, all this was getting on her nerves.

"Hasn't she told you? I mean… Hasn't she told the old you?" Bonnie gestured to make her statement clearer.

Katherine shook her head in frustration. "You better.." her sentence was stopped by something that would have made her laugh, if it wasn't for the fact that she was aware some master plan was happening on her back, leaving her clueless.

The vision that appeared and obfuscated her sight suddenly became interesting.

_Mystic Falls,1864_

"Oh please, don't mind me" Katherine actually meant to put embarrassment between the two laying on the bed, in a compromising position.

Their lucky star wanted both Elena and Damon to be still dressed up. Well.. apart from his unbuttoned shirt.

"What about me,Damon? Don't you know it's rude to leave a young lady out of a civil conversation?" Katherine approached, her voice sensual.

"Get out" Elena ordered, pissed knew what her evil twin had in mind.

Katherine ignored the comment, throwing herself playfully on Damon's chest, kissing his neck.

"I don't care you're a vampire, Katherine" he whispered, staring at the ceiling. "I want you to leave right now"

"Do you want me to get out, Damon? Imagine what it could be to have two identical twin to toy with. Double pleasure implied" She smiled mischievously, approaching even more until her knees were brushing the blankets and his member.

Surprisingly, he didn't object.

Elena fought hard to hold back her breath, along with the impulse of screaming out what was gonna be of Damon after Katherine had played her games. But she needed to shut up and let things happen.

A hand ran down his Chest, until it reached the zip of his pants.

"Good boy" Katherine smiled darkly, as she held his member in front of Elena.

He closed his eyes, parting his lips when the gentle strokes became harder.

"Get.. out" he begged.

Katherine bent down on him, as Elena closed her eyes.

This could not be happening.

"What is wrong, my dear?" the vampire asked, eyeing the human girl from her erotic position. "Never seen this before?"

Elena had no strength to answer.

"Well, I can arrange something that might fix that" a devil grin enlightened her lips.

Katherine grabbed Elena by the light material of the chemise she was wearing, and neared her to Damon's mouth.

"Easy task. Kiss him" she ordered, cocky.

Damon had his eyes fixed on the girl a few inches from his face. Her pride would have never let her do that.. And..

And then Damon made the next move, tossing his hands between her hair and moaning in her mouth when at the change of treatment going on his lower part.

Elena didn't want to see. But she understood, from the noises, that Katherine was skillful using her mouth.

This had just crossed the line.

_**Feedbacks are LOVE!**_


	11. Chapter 11

_Okay, this should have been way shorter… But I couldn't split it in two. I was too eager to go ahead with the plot, as there's the heart of the event going on from this chapter on._

_Be careful that sleeping with someone you barely knew, in the 1800's, was considered a shame._

_Of course Damon and Elena had known each other for longer. Even if he isn't actually aware of it.. But you can see how he's starting to suspect there's something wrong in her._

_A/N: Katherine told Damon about vampires, Stefan may know it, but I still haven't gotten to that point. _

_CRUCIAL CHAPTER,GUYS!_

_**The First Founder's Ball**_

"It's better for me to leave" Elena announced, her cheek suddenly turning into a brilliant red shape, that might have made everybody's mind outside that room wonder what they had been doing inside there for half a hour. She was feeling dizzy and disgusted.

Katherine stood up slowly, getting her gown adjusted, a satisfied smile on her lips turned into a mischievous one when she realized what they had just accomplished.

"What? Do not deny this wasn't quite pleasant " the vampire rudely ignored Elena after the statement, turning to face Damon.

Something in the back of the human doppelganger's mind, screamed loudly to be recalled.

Elena stood there, staring at a blank point in front of her.

What did she have to remind?

"Nobody will ever know, this is something you'll share just with the three of us" the voice of the evil twin echoed in her mind in the same moment Katherine pronounced those words to Damon.

"You compelled me!" Elena blurt out, furious. The effect of the herb was slowly leaving her system,rendering it hard to be protected from the dangerous ability.

The she-vampire's expression pouted. "I thought that would work on you." She shook of head.

"I drink vervain. It hasn't worn off yet." Elena's eyes grew wet with tears of anger. She couldn't have just done that. Couldn't the effect have worked a few minutes before all the big mess was made?

Katherine shrugged. "Too bad then. I'll have to come out with something else to entertain myself.."

The poor human had nothing to say.

She felt ashamed, naughty and .. dirty.

"You're a selfish bitch". And with that stated aloud, Elena took off slamming the door behind her.

Damon got up all of a sudden, out of the hypnosis "Why would you force your sister?" he asked in unbelief, still uncertain of his own moves. "What's going on in my head? I'd never…" he massaged his temples.

"Yes, you would. And don't say you didn't like…" Katherine began,smirking. But Damon heard the same voice that'd been haunting his thoughts for over two days.

"Get out of my way, Katherine".

He went over Elena, running down the stairs and catching every servant's attention.

"Elena!" he screamed.

"What's wrong, brother?" Stefan stood suddenly in his way, concern sincerely showing.

"Just a sisterly incomprehension. " he muttered never taking his gaze off of her, reaching for the girl by now on the doorsteps.

"Please,Elena.." Damon's heart tightened in his chest, causing an unknown pain to take control of his body.

"Just let me go" she pleaded,trying to get her wrist free of his hold, but he didn't let her run away.

"She compelled you, Damon" Elena blurt out, her voice reaching an high octave.

He narrowed his eyes, his feelings hurt. "Did she?"

Elena nodded, looking away, to avoid those piercing tears to come down just at the sight of the man she loved. She hated seeing him that vulnerable.

"Look at me" he begged, cupping her little face in his strong hands. "Look at me.." he whispered, again.

She obeyed this time, wanting nothing more than feel the protection of his embrace.

"Oh, Damon" Elena sobbed, throwing herself into his arms.

He didn't push her back. He simply held her tight, whishing that moment would have never ended.

_Some hours later_

"You look beyond amazing, Miss Elena" Emily stared at the slim figure of the young girl through the mirror.

The electric, deep blue dress made the olive complexion of Elena's skin glimpse under an astonishing light, her tiny curves didn't stand out in any way that could be near the "outrageous".

The slightest touch of make-up had been applied, yet her beauty was something that could make you stand in awe. A few locks of hair framed her perfect face.

"Thank you, Emily" her voice betrayed her confident appearance.

The witch approached, gently touching one of her shoulder. "I suppose you are quite nervous, am I wrong?"

Elena smiled a warm smile. "No, you are completely right. I'm afraid of what she might do to Damon." She confessed, looking down.

Emily squeezed Elena's shoulder to comfort her. "You know the history the Salvatores better than I do. You just need to stick to whatever your plan is, and let events occur."

"Yes." The girl nodded. "I just don't want to interfere with the future."

Emily narrowed her eyes. "I'll do my best to contact my heir, Bonnie."

The doppelganger's eyes brightened, as the witch suggested her to hurry near downstairs to wait for her chaperone and enjoy her night out.

Elena was nervous, waiting alone in the parlor.

She felt like a teenager the night of her first prom, with her first crush.

"Elena" Damon's voice stopped her before any more unneeded and concerned twisted thought was made.

She turned around to see him walking to her, his eyes wide with what she recognized as appreciation. He was wearing a dark suite with a dark blue chemise underneath. She smiled at the fact that their outfits matched, without even them planning on it.

"You're the best beauty I could have ever seen" his greeting made her heart crumble in her chest, and a new smile appear. She neared her head to his… and she stopped.

What was she doing, kissing him in the middle of the boarding house?

"Thank you" she whispered in his ear, sadly deviating the contact with his lips. "You're pretty handsome, too."

He smiled warmly, provoking the same reaction to her heart.

"Shall we reach the carriage? My brother and Katherine are waiting for us". He offered gently his arm to lead her outside.

When they reached the inside of the carriage, Katherine eyed her, but didn't say anything.

In the faint light you could still see how eye catching was the blood red dress the vampire was wearing, perfectly matching the hair clips in her curly hair.

Stefan was the gentleman he used to be "Good evening, Elena" he smiled, and she couldn't help but do the same back. "Good evening, Stefan"

Damon smirked satisfied, avoiding Katherine's glance.

"This is going to be a good night" the vampire voice called for the attention to focus on her.

They got to the Lockwood's mansion quite sooner than Elena expected the horses would do.

When she was introduced to Tyler's ancestors, she couldn't help but find it a bit creepy.

They got inside, her hand still in Damon's arm, his wonderful scent filling the girl's lungs. She thought it as if her life was a comparison with that.

She could breathe without Damon, but it didn't bring to her any pleasure or happiness. It didn't make her feel alive.

"This is so good" she announced, looking around. "I guess it took days to build this up".

Candle lights were everywhere ,people filled the place and there was nowhere that it wasn't either full of food or expensive furniture.

"Euphemism. " Damon's soft laugh made her stand in awe. "It took months." He smiled, and surprisingly it reached his eyes.

"What is that melancholy showing on your face about?" he asked, brushing slightly the tips of his fingers on her jaw. Too bad he was wearing gloves.

She didn't want to lie. So she went for the half-truth.

"I just wish your happiness to last" she whispered, wanting to close her eyes at the contact he was making. But then she'd have lost the sight of the iced-blue depths of his eyes.

"As long as I have you next to me, this is my happiness" Damon murmured, feeling his heart racing when her eyes enlightened at his words.

He had thought his life was losing its meaning day by day… Until Elena had come.

She was the savior of him.

The notes of a slow and soothing song filled the air of the huge dance floor, Elena could tell she had heard that song somewhere… Founder's Ball of the 2010. Yes, when she was training with Stefan for the upcoming event.

He seemed to follow her train of thoughts, surprising her. "Shall we dance?" the thrill of his voice made a smile appear on her lips. "Sure"

The first thing they did –well, not that they hadn't been doing it all along- was eye contact.

Cold blue mixed with warm brown, and the no measure of time mattered. Nobody else was in their minds but each other.

All Elena could feel was Damon.

All Damon could feel was the miracle in his embrace called Elena.

His arm wrapped bolt her tiny waist, his thoughts wished that corset was taken off to feel the softness of her skin. He wasn't sure where the feeling came from, but he missed it. He missed a contact with her that deep down he had never actually had.

And she, how she'd have wanted to remind him how much she loved him! Elena wasn't sure that could have been held back longer.

"You're a good dancer" he complimented, his face to closed hers. She welcomed the nearness .

"I've tried just a few times" _and if only you knew who I danced with, 147 years from now_. She grinned at the paradox.

"I shall tell you.." Damon began, the lump on his throat growing with each breath he took. "You're the first woman who's even made me feel like this."

Elena was astonished on how this human Damon could struggle with his own words to reveal his feelings.

She wasn't taken a lot aback from his confession though. She had always known they were meant to be, no matter when, no matter what.

"I know it's only been two days, but in all this.. confusion, you're the only thing that keeps me from falling. Thank you, for being here with me" she said sincerely, her voice filled with emotion.

He wanted to touch her, to cup her face and show how much he cared.

But the dance wasn't over yet, and they needed to keep on going. His legs ,though, felt weakened by her confession.

It had only been two days. Why, then, did he love her already?

One minute later the whole crowd had their eyes fixed on the two couples on the dance floor. The Petrova were united with the Salvatore and their dancing was just enchanting, something you could see in princesses' movies : nobody was able to look elsewhere.

When the dance was over, the craved request for privacy had the best on Damon's patience.

"Do you want to take some fresh air?" he asked, grinning.

She couldn't help but reflect his expression.

"Fresh air it is"

Walking through the back gardens, Elena shivered slightly at the lowered temperature.

Damon caught how cold she had become, and didn't hesitate to remove his jacked and offer it to her. She thanked him, pleased at the gesture.

"I'm sorry, but I had already enough of the folk" he apologized, sincerely.

"So did I" she replied, in agreement.

"We were having that nice little conversation, before the dance required all of your attention" he teased, her cheeks turned red in response.

Was it too early to tell him?

Oh, screw that.

"Damon.." she whispered, stopping her walking.

Their gazes locked just like some minutes before, and they stepped closer.. and closer.

Until her breath was combined with his, until they couldn't remember their own names and their lips brushed for the first time ever .

He moved his attention on her lower lip, massaging it with his tongue as she parted them to welcome him inside of her.

He teased her a little bit more, biting it.

Elena moaned his name, and he couldn't take any more of that. He finally threw himself into a passionate dance within their tongues, nobody cared if their hands were exploring forbidden places.

"We should stop" she murmured, trying to convince herself more than him.

"I don't want to." he answered steadily, holding her head still.

"Neither do I " was all that she said before she couldn't talk the next five minutes.

"Please" she begged. "Take me away"

He nodded, lust showing in his eyes. The beauty in front of him had rendered him so vulnerable he didn't recognize himself anymore.

A carriage was quickly called as they said goodbye to the Lockwood's mansion.

When they got to the boarding house, it was already dark inside, the servants asleep.

"Hush up!" he murmured, trying to stop her giggle. But it just made him laugh back.

They headed upstairs, hand in hand, until they reached Damon's bedroom door.

She wondered if it had been the same all over those years.. And the thought of if the Damon of the present would ever known this was going to be one of the best night of her life, crossed her mind.

He brushed her lips quickly, before pushing her inside the room.

"What a long night" he was sarcastic, as he threw himself kissing her bare neck, helping her removing her gown and her petticoat.

"The undressing part is even going to be longer" she replied, pissed at the corset that didn't seem to respond her trembling fingers.

"Here" he teased. " A woman of your age can't even get rid of her clothes"

Her expression went blank, fearing he had misunderstood something. Fearing he had known something he shouldn't.

"Elena" he called, cupping her head in his hands. "What I meant is.. Is this..is this your first time?"

How could she lie to him?

But then again, it was for his own sake.

"No." she breathed, hating herself. "Is it..for you?" she asked, afraid Katherine had already marked her territory.

When he didn't confirm her suspect, she sighed in relief. Yet, she felt selfish for lying to him.

"No.." he murmured, "But if you desire to know.. I have never made love to your sister" she turned to have her corset removed from him, trying hard to hide the relieved expression on her face.

It went on the floor with a deaf thump.

Her underwear was quickly thrown away as their naked bodies were admired in the faint light of the moon.

It was like a flashback, reminding her their first time had been in the same room, with the same atmosphere . Just some years later.

She smiled, admiring his sculpted body was always the same.

He felt alive when her fingers touched his exposed flesh, leaving burning paths behind.

"Are you the doppelganger?" He demanded, all of a sudden.

"Yes" she murmured, afraid of what have might come next.

"Does it make you supernatural?" he was skeptic.

"Yes it does, Damon." She thought she had caught his train of thoughts, yet she didn't want to guess wrongly. "What is it?" Elena ran her fingers through his hair.

"Can you procreate?" his voice trembled,as Elena parted her lips to speak. But he stopped her. "It's not that I wouldn't want it. But Father, he thinks both me and Stefan live by his rules and…"

"Shh" she reassured him. "I can't have children.." she'd be telling the truth, if she'd be speaking to the present Damon.

_Please forgive me_ . Was all that she could think.

"Hush up…" she whispered, leaning over to kiss him.

She thought on how this may have changed her life, forever.

But then his hands were brought to either sides of her tights, brushing them so gently to make her shiver and lose control of her thoughts.

One hand slipped out of her hair, tracing an invisible path down to her bare chest, squeezing her breasts and her nipples. When they were hardened enough, he let the burning parts to the piercing air, as he admired the beauty below him.

Elena kept her eyes closed and her lips slightly parted, to welcome another kiss.

"You're astonishing" he whispered, as he moved two fingers slowly inside of her.

She moaned in his mouth, wishing the moment could last forever.

As if Damon had known her body's for an entire life, her G spot was quickly found and teased, along with her clit.

She moaned again,louder this time.

"Shh" he tried to say, but he was really enjoying how she emanated those sounds for him. "There are people in the house"

His voice only made her arousal fill the air with the scent of sex, and he couldn't help but lower his lips to her core.

"Damon,please " she begged, holding his head between her sweated hands. "Enough teasing".

He didn't need anything else to spread her legs wide and brush her entrance with his member.

Again, their gazed were locked, as if they needed each other's support more than the air to breathe.

"I love you,Damon"


	12. Chapter 12

_Next chapter's gonna be the last one in 1864. Enjoy! And thanks for the reviews, you're so amazing._

_Remember… __**FEEDBACKS ARE INSPIRATION AND LOVE!**_

_**The tie that binds**_

Damon's body froze in shock at the revelation.

Deep down in his heart he knew she'd said those words, but the other half of his soul still couldn't believe what his ears just made him hear.

"Say it again.." he begged, his eyes growing wet with tears at the inexperienced love that menaced to invade him.

She gently brushed her fingers on his cheek, heat leaving from her flesh right onto his.

Her depths still locked into his, Elena whispered keeping her voice firm and determinate.

"I love you, Damon Salvatore. " her swollen lips gave him a smile that warmed his heart even more, making him feel it growing bigger in his chest. His breath sped, as if the action actually happened inside of his body.

"I love you, Elena"

With that, there was no more to say.

He entered her slowly, as her nails pierced his back, his flesh felt the cuts on it. Instead of feeling pain, Damon adverted only a sense of belonging. He was hers.

Elena couldn't believe what the previous minutes had brought.

And she still wasn't sure if all this was happening.

The sound of his heart against her chest, though, reminded her that all of what she was living was vivid and real, as weird and twisted that it was.

She could do nothing more than observe every single inch of his perfect face, losing herself in his gaze with every thrust his body gave into hers.

She rolled her hips, her legs went locking themselves on his back.

The smell of sex and sweat was all over them, and she felt the pleasuring feeling grow stronger each second.

Elena closed her eyes, enjoying his member moving into her.

"Faster" she begged, biting her lower lip. She couldn't scream, yet she didn't remember why.

A moan escaped from him, and the sound of his husky voice sent her on the street of the no return, closer and closer to the edge.

He obeyed her request, angling slightly straighter on her body to reach her delicate spot. On the next thrust, she throw her head into his collar bone, biting hard his flesh not to scream.

Damon moaned in both pain and pleasure, entering her faster from Elena's sudden and unexpected move.

"Come and scream for me" he begged, watching how her expression crooked, trying to keep all inside of her. Her brows narrowed, her cheeks turned even darker.

A drop of sweat ran down her temple, as he caught it with his tongue.

"Damon.." she murmured, her voice lacking in some point of her word.

That gave him enough power to move even more, to please her as much as he could, until she was screaming his name.

"I'm .. I'm… so close" were her last words before her climax took away all of her strengths left to even formulate a sentence.

"Elena!" he screamed, his hands pressed on her tights… And he followed her.

Elena thought that it was done. That maybe in that moment… She was binding herself to Damon.

Forever.

"This was the best night of my life" he whispered into her ear, as she cringed on his bare chest.

"Was?" she demanded, skeptical.

"Well..." he began, but was soon cut off. She turned to give him a quick peck on his lips to add "I can show you a way or two to prolong it.." she smirked in the way of his doing. That only turned him on even more.

He laughed softly, stroking her naked back.

"Oh really?" he teased, throwing the covers on their bodies to continue their night together.

The sun was just beginning to set when a pair of hands brushed her sleeping face.

She moaned in protest, yet she opened her eyes because she couldn't wait to see his blue depths again.

"Time to wake up" he whispered, kissing her forehead. "The servants are going to come in soon to help me get dressed and washed up" he stated, annoyed by that.

She moaned in understanding back, removing the silk blankets from her tiny frame.

Once she sat down, her head spun a little around from all the activity they had been doing the whole night, and the obvious lack of slumber.

"Not so fast" he wrapped his arms around her and forced her back on the mattress.

"But you said.." Elena began, but was cut off by one kiss.

"We can do faster than soon" Damon whispered nonsense, causing her to giggle.

Gosh, he'd have wanted to be into her every time that pleading sound left her sweet lips.

"Alright then" she agreed, blushing when his fingers brushed her entrance, bringing back to memory all the flashes of the previous hours.

"Yes.." she moaned when he entered her, playing around.

"You're so wet." He was satisfied and cocky.

With the strength she could manage to obtain, Elena slapped Damon on his shoulder, remembering she wouldn't have needed all of that when he quickly reminded her of his human state.

"Ouch" Damon protested, causing one more giggle to escape her.

He couldn't take no more, his hardness was causing him a thumping pain.

She saw it, and went to play around with her hands wrapped around it.

"No" he stopped her. "I want to come inside of you."

She didn't wait for any other encouragement, she spread her legs open behind him and threw herself in another kiss.

In the middle of the make out session, Elena found herself on top, guiding her body into his entrance.

More moans and groans escaped their lips .

He thrust hard into her, eager, and accompanied her gestures by placing his hands on her hips and eventually squeezing her breasts.

"You were meant for me" he appreciated, pulling her down from her cascade of dark hair to his lips, tracing its border with his tongue.

The inclination found her g-spot, making her release come soon after, followed by his.

When she got back to her room with some pieces of her clothes on, Emily was asleep, so had no time to ask the human questions.

Elena threw herself back into bed, hoping to get some deserved sleep, but was awakened just when she thought she was about to drift to unconsciousness .

When the young girl learned both of the Salvatores would have been busy with the Loockwoods' Council and Reunions, she grew concerned about spending her breakfast with Katherine.

"I bet you and Damon had fun last night" she said mischievously behind her tea cup.

Elena raised one eyebrow, remembering Damon's room was sided by her twin's.

"I could say the same of you, Katherine" she replied bitterly, gaining a smirk of appreciation from the evil doppelganger.

"So." The vampire began, willing to change argument. "What are you up to, here in Mystic Falls?"

Elena felt relieved thinking about her being many steps ahead of Katherine.

"None of your business" she said uncaring, as the girl in front of her narrowed her brows back in response.

"Just know that I gave you one chance to enjoy yourself. Now it's time for you to step back." The vampire warned.

"Oh really? Are you afraid a doppelganger could mess your contorted plan on "how to get both the Salvatores sweep at my feet"?" Elena teased, actually pissed off.

Katherine's face darkened. "And what do you know of it?"

Elena grinned, not answering.

"I'll make you go through hell, Elena. That's for granted." The warn had something in it that made the human's hair lift up on the back of her neck.

Katherine would have gotten her revenge.

If Elena wasn't spontaneously willing to leave town on her own, then she'd put her on the conditions of it.


	13. Chapter 13

_HEY! This is basically the last chapter of Mystic Falls in 1864. Next one is going to be the closure of it with a few lines . _

_Also, know that Damon thinks Elena's Katherine's lost relative, but they call each other sisters because of the covering. _

_**FEEDBACKS ARE LOVE . **_

_**You'll be out of here soon.**_

_10 days later_

It was weird how much Elena was enjoying her staying in the past.

Mornings were a quiet event, as she had learned to pull Katherine's remarks away, creating a private boll between her and Damon. After a couple of days, she had began to like the older Stefan, so she would exchange a few words with him sometimes. Most of the time it was him asking her suggestions on how to court her _"sister"._

Evenings were spent together in the gardens. Damon would read her books and talk about the most random facts ever. Eventually their talks would lead them to romance themes, and what their thoughts about love were.

He grew fonder of her with every moment spent together.

And their nights were never long enough for them to be mentally tired.

Elena put the guilty feeling aside.

The Damon of the present wanted that baby as much as she did. And the little that lie she told his old self the night when they first connected, was for the best.

Elena was now in front of the same mirror, Emily was helping her out with the corset she had learnt to hate.

"I can't stand all this clothing." She commented. " I love the gowns, though. They're romantic"

The servant smiled, showing Elena her favorite piece of cloth, in the shade of a dark blue.

"Do you wish to wear this for the morning,Miss?" she asked, already knowing the question.

"Yes, thank you" Elena smiled warmly as the witch secured it on her lower back.

When the girl headed downstairs, everybody was waiting for her sit at the table.

"Good morning, Miss Elena" Giuseppe greeted, as she quickly bowed and answered kindly.

Right after that the quiet talks began.

"So, how did you sleep tonight, sister?" Katherine asked, trying to make her twin feel awkward.

"Just like you did, sister" Elena smiled back, trying hard not to grin when the doppelganger narrowed her eyebrows and turned to Stefan. "We're so glad you're hosting us and giving me and my _beloved_ twin all the best comforts" the human smiled to the eldest Salvatore,as Damon held her hand under the table.

The servings were then brought, and the smell of the breakfast filled the room.

Elena pinched her nose. "Ugh.." she muttered.

"What?" Damon eyed her, curious.

"Uhm I.. May you excuse me." She referred mostly to the men and left, her hands covering and pushing hard on her mouth, as to hold back the things that threatened to come out.

Damon didn't even bother to say anything, but stood up and went after her.

Elena couldn't make it upstairs, so she opted for the servant's bathroom. Just like last time.

She heard he was behind her, so she didn't even bother to close the door.

Instead,she knelt down and let everything out.

Cold hands went around her neck, wrapping her hair out of the way.

"Please.." she tried to say between the throwing up. "You don't have to watch this".

Damon narrowed his eyes in concern. "No way I'm living you. It will be okay soon, love. Hold on to that"

Tears let Elena's eyes against her will.

What were those for, now? She was just puking!

"Shhh" Damon soothed her, brushing her back.

When she was over, she pulled back and went to the washboard to clean her face and her hands.

"You needn't to cry" he caressed her cheeks while she kept her gaze down. "I'll call a doctor and you'll see he'll heal whatever you have"

His blue depths were trying hard not to show the fear.

If his Elena was ill, then it could take a second for death to bring her away.

"No" Elena told back, almost screaming. He exchanged that for fear of doctors.

"Yes. You shall not be afraid at ten and seven, now. Could you?" he tried to smirk.

Elena didn't know how to handle it. She went for more lies. "I have drank my tea in a hush. That explains why I felt sick. And my corset needs to be unlaced." She swallowed the guilt. "I'm alright, Damon"

Go figures if he would have called a doctor. He would have found out about her pregnancy.

All signs had been there for five days by now. Morning sickness, the need to sleep a lot, hysterical weepings and cravings for weird stuff to eat.

She was pregnant.

Wait.

Had she really thought that?

She smiled, placing her hands on her belly.

She had succeeded.

She was carrying a new life inside of her. Damon's baby.

Tears of joy streamed down her face, holding the man that had let her life have a new meaning.

She skipped breakfast, deciding to have a walk through the gardens and the fountains .

Elena loved the old Mystic Falls, it was better than books and journals talked about. It seemed a little pretty place just come out of a fairytale.

Well, the villains weren't lacking, at least.

She was over the edge with her happiness, yet a part of her wished to go back and scream it aloud.

It was a bad thing Damon couldn't know.

But after all,how long had she left here.. Two days?

She could handle it.

It was weird though, the symptoms of her pregnancy were already showing.

It took three months for women to have them bothering their bodies. Maybe it was because the human Damon was affected by the present's one?

Lost in thoughts, she almost missed the faint noise coming from the flowered bushes in front of her.

Elena rose and fixed her head on it, her senses in alert.

When she heard the noise again, she looked around, realizing it was just like her dream.

And all her mind could process was the oblige to run.

The wind was piercing her fragile skin like a razor, she panted for breath as she cursed the too tightened corset.

Elena gathered the silk material of her gown in her fists, hoping that would have helped her legs to move faster.

And just like her nightmare, a branch stood in her way making her face the ground.

She closed her eyes , trembling and sobbing, waiting for the end to come.

When a cold hand touched her skin, she turned and saw her face.

"Hello, my dear." Katherine said, threatening. "I'm sorry for this. But I need you out of the way"

Boom.

She saw nothing else, darkness surrounded her.

_Mystic Falls, Present Days._

"What the hell did you do to her?" Damon threw Katherine on the wall the moment some blood left Elena's head, spoiling the silk pillow under it.

The vampire was stronger than the eldest Salvatore, but she let him push her and beat her down anyway.

She didn't want to hurt Elena, either.

Somebody pulled Damon out of the way, making his back hit hard on the opposite wall.

He didn't get it. "Stefan, she hurt her!"

His little brother approached him, his voice didn't lack control when he slowly spoke the words: "It's the old her, Damon. "

Katherine's eyes grow wet with tears of guilt.

"I'll kill her, if that will make her stop hurting Elena!" he spit on Stefan's face and headed towards the bed to hold tight her hand.

And the only reason why he hadn't tried that already was because in his thoughts Elena was waking up from her unconsciousness.

_Mystic Falls, 1864_

"Please, Elena" Damon whispered as the girl's eyes showed the will to open. "I need you here. Wake up"

She knew that. She wanted to answer him.

"Dam.." she began, finding her voice again. "Damon"

A weak smile appeared on her lips, a reflection of the small victory Damon's one had in his.

"I love you" he murmured, cupping her head into his hands and kissing her forehead.

"I love you, too" she said back, slowly getting her strengths back.

When she looked around, she saw Katherine sat on her bed, the best faked-concerned look on her face.

Elena's anger, anyway, blurred away the moment she realized other people were in the room with them.

On the doorsteps, there were Stefan and Giuseppe. And on his way out, a man on his fifties that looked like what the girl whished he wasn't.

"We need to talk, Mr. Salvatore" the man pleaded, headed outside.

"Yes, surely Dr. Raymond" Giuseppe agreed by nodding his face in concern.

When they were out of the door, Stefan closed it behind him, leaving the three in the room .

"You may want to excuse us, Mr. Stefan Salvatore. But it's a strictly private conversation about Miss Pierce's sanity". The doctor seemed uncomfortable with his own words.

Stefan adverted it, and with one last glance at his father, hurried upstairs.

In the room, Katherine was listening to everything going on outside.

"What?" Elena teased, her weakness had left her body the moment she had realized she had just been checked up by a doctor. "Your plan's failed. Sad enough?"

Damon exchanged one confused look between the twins."What's going on here?"

"Shh" Katherine hushed them abruptly, pointing her index finger up.

After a moment of silence, she froze in shock widening her eyes. "Oh goodness. How could you,sister?"

She turned to Elena with a shocked and betrayed expression. Her brown eyes narrowed as she stood up slowly.

"What are you talking about?" Elena asked for more explanations, worrying that Katherine's way of doing had something going on beneath the surface.

"I.. I don't know how you could not tell me!" She burst out, raising her hands to the air. "Now they'll blame me for your own mistakes"

"Katherine" she tried to scream, her voice came out husky."The only one here who's ever made mistakes is you!"

Damon approached Elena to soothe her down.

"Shh. Don't waste your strengths." He turned to face Katherine, angst covered his face. "What the hell is going on out there, Katherine?"

Just in the moment the question was given, an indignant Giuseppe burst in the door.

"Misses Pierce. You're out of this mansion. Now."


	14. Chapter 14

_I could have stopped with the 1864 parts in the last chapter… But things needed to be done well._

_DRAMA AND ROMANCE fills this pages. And I really hope you like it._

_Even if they seem to see their happy ever after right on the corner…. Well, believe me, both Damon and Elena are completely wrong._

_**REVIEW!IT MEANS LOVE AND SUPPORT.**_

_**Stronger than any measure of time**_

"What do you mean, Father?" Damon interrupted the brief silence that had owned the cold room.

Elena had no strength to talk.

Not when she felt the old man's eyes full of disgust on her, not when humiliation and guilt denied her lungs to be given air.

She had been busted.

Giuseppe Salvatore knew she was pregnant.

"This young lady who claimed to be utterly fond of us all, she's a betraying and a shame to this mansion!" the man stood on the threshold, his hands rolling freely in the air.

"Father!" Stefan's concerned face suddenly burst out from the darkness behind his back.

He put his own hands on the old man's, stopping him and trying to soothe him from having an heart attack.

Elena trembled under the silk covers.

Not for cold.

For _fear._

Something hot streamed fastidious paths on her cheeks, which she figured were tears that filled her narrowed face.

"Elena" Damon whispered in a trembling voice, turning to her with pain and panic.

"What happened here?" Stefan screamed to overwhelm his father's shouts.

"She's seven weeks pregnant!" Giuseppe blurt out, his face red with anger and his index finger pointed at the tiny figure of the guilty human in the bed.

Damon felt nothing. He thought his heart had clenched so bad inside of his chest that he was by now a dead man and what was going on before his eyes were all something his imagination was producing.

Instead, all the scene in front of him kept on going on even if he couldn't say a word or name his feelings.

Katherine faked shock placing her hands to her mouth, getting her eyes fill with fake horror and pain.

"How could you, sister!"

"It can't be" Damon let out, almost unconsciously."No." he stared blankly at the covers.

Stefan froze in shock, as Giuseppe continued with his talking, his voice suddenly turned controlled and cold. "This is a disgrace. We're one of the most estimated families here in Mystic Falls." he stopped for a while, staring at his kids. "I will not let either of my sons being _spoilt_ with a _fortuitous _human being like her!".

He stopped for a short while, staring at the complete clone of the guilty lady. "I order you and your sister out of this estate by the light of the approaching dawn."

Katherine went pale. Like never either of the Salvatores had seen.

She tried to hold back her rage with all the strength a vampire could manage to utilize .

She couldn't kill Elena. Not now. Not with all those witnesses.

She had to take off. Before she might act and regret it.

When she understood she was about to tear everybody limb to limb in the room, she excused herself and headed out of the mansion _to "hunt"._

Elena was still, her sight vacant in blank spaces in front of her.

She never meant for it to end this way.

She had messed up the whole history. Just when she'd thought she had done things right, when she needed two more days for this whole thing to be over and live her live serene.

But of course happiness was something too out of reach for her.

She hoped present Damon was fine. She hoped tearing her heart apart, crying her soul out.

Stefan was staring at her, waiting for her attention to be focused on him.

"Did you know, Elena?" his voice was as cold and detached just like his father's.

At least she was glad he didn't love her.

Just like the present Stefan. Maybe they were never meant to be. Neither 147 years before.

"I.." she looked at him, lacking explanations and holding back a sob pursing her lips. This, out of all the predictable scenarios, was not one she had seen coming.

Damon finally spoke. "You told me.." he stood up, failing to keep himself from screaming. "You told me that you couldn't procreate !" he kicked the seat next to the bed.

He felt like a fool for believing the woman before him, even just for a second.

For loving her.

Elena was startled, as she pressed her back on the wooden headboard ,more silent tears framed her contorted face.

Stefan seemed taken aback by his brother's outburst.

"You lied to me, Elena! You made me fall in love with you when you were already somebody else's ! You used me to be safe and sound . To have money to grow a stranger's son!" he kicked a foot stool.

"Damon.." Stefan pleaded. But he wasn't listening.

The love of his life wasn't real.

The love of his life was a random stranger's out there. Not man enough to leave Elena alone with a new life growing inside of her. Spoiling her forever.

"Stay out of this, Stefan!" he almost growled at his younger brother, then turned back to face Elena.

She was too weak to stand, but she tried. Her feet touched the ground and her knees trembled twice, in the meanwhile she begged the man in front of her, fighting against her own body.

"Damon I love you" her weak voice was cracked with emotion, her sight blurred with painful and aching tears that burnt so much that she had to let them flow.

Damon's expression softened, unable to deny his feelings for the woman who would've soon left him.

"Why did you do this do me? "

Emily caught them in the middle of it, not feeling guilty for a second. She had sensed every single thing of the event, of course.

"Mr. Salvatore needs you in his office, Elena" she called after her miss, leaving soon after without even excusing herself.

The witch was completely mad at Katherine.

Elena walked with a heavy heart past Damon to reach for her maid.

"Emily!" she called once in the corridor .

"You have a few minutes left, Elena." She informed swiftly, aggravated. " I succeeded to contact Bonnie, you need to get back before the balance is unsettled. Katherine needs to stay here or Stefan and Damon will never exist" she stated urgent, as Elena nodded and run as fast as she could to the eldest Salvatore.

* * *

><p>"Mr Salvatore" the girl announced, once in his room, still in her nightgown.<p>

A shame for the century, but she didn't care . Although Giuseppe was even more sure of his decision when the young shame crossed the threshold.

"You need to leave my sister out of this. I am the one to blame, none of this occurrence has anything to do with her."

The master stood up from his leather chair, reaching the place where Elena stood.

"If your sister stays, then you would better leave right away. I am so bitter that I wish you may lose the baby. If somebody would ever get to know about this shame to our family, I even wish your own death".

His eyes reflected his serious words, in the same color of Stefan's.

Elena couldn't believe his words. She let her jaw drop for a second, remembering how many times the present Damon had told her he hated his father.

She could see so much clearly his point of view now, and felt the need to suppress, somehow, the hurt that surrounded Damon's memory about his father.

"How dare you! I'm so glad Damon hates you, because you're the most selfish human I've ever met in my entire life. You should lose your own sons to get what you're talking about. You don't deserve either of them!" She screamed into his face.

Then his hand went flying in the air, slapping with power her delicate face.

Elena fell on the floor at the impact, tears flowed copiously both from pain and more humiliation.

She let her cheeks rest on the floor, her eyes covering her face in a dark curtain.

And she stayed there, sobbing and trembling.

* * *

><p>"Father!" Damon screamed, pushing him away as far as he could manage. Giuseppe fell down fainting.<p>

The young man bent to hold the fragile girl in his embrace, as she kept her sight down.

"Shh,love" he tried to soothe her, as Elena cringed in his chest, seeking protection. "It's okay" he whispered, rocking her slightly.

"Let me see where he hurt you" he pleaded, trying to remove Elena's hands from her small face.

Another high pitched sob released her. "I'm sorry Damon, I deserved this".

He answered bitterly. "I swear to God he's going to pay for this. He's just lost one of his sons forever."

Damon cursed under his breath when he saw the big bruise forming on her face.

Elena felt she was fading away, losing sensations in her legs and lower body.

"We'll meet again one day, Damon" bitterness in her whispered voice.

She hold his hand placing it to her belly.

"I wish you could understand. I wish you could know" she begged for him to read the truth in her eyes.

The man before her narrowed his eyebrows, stroking her sane cheek. "What are you talking about?I'm coming with you!" he exclaimed, knowing she didn't want him to.

Elena shook her head. "You'll have to be apart from me. I promise you, you'll be happy again. You have to let me go now" she almost lost her voice.

Damon confused his words for something else. "Elena!" he blurt out, shaking her slightly. "You can't leave me! I love you more than my own life".

Elena smiled weakly, feeling her own bones disappearing. "I know that. I love you more than a human could ever manage to do. This is for our future Damon."

Damon's tears drop silently down to touch her cheeks, melting with her own salty waterfalls.

"Please forgive me. " Elena begged with all the voice she had left, stroking his cheek one last time. "I love you".

His blue agonized depths were the last thing she saw.

* * *

><p><em>Mystic Falls, Present Days.<em>

Elena's chest heaved suddenly, her eyes spread open, as she let more tears fall out of them.

Damon bent over her, welcoming her in his own chest continuing off from where they'd left 147 years before, as they cried together along with their memories.

"I love you so much Elena" he murmured in her chocolate hair.

She pulled back, gazing him with the realization of having been dropped in the present. Her eyes wondered for a while.

There was a brief pause, where she saw her whole life with him picturing before her .Where she didn't even believe what had happened.

"I'm pregnant, Damon" she suddenly blurt out, not sure if she was telling it to herself or she was realizing it out loud for him to know. And cried with joy, as he smiled his warmest smile she swore she had never seen before.

"I know you are. I was there" Damon's own voice melted with emotions, he cupped her face and kissed every inch of it.

Elena's eyes filled with even more light than possible wiping away all the traces of his pain and sufferance. "You remember?" she asked in awe.

Damon simply nodded, unable to control his voice. The happiness he felt went beyond any expectations, it was nowhere like the first time she'd told him she cared. Not even like when they first kissed, or they first slept together.

This was the promise of their eternity being bonded and proved with a life they could both love more than their own.

He wouldn't have known what to do without such a joy. And the thought that he had almost stopped Elena from accomplishing all this..

"I made it" she sobbed, touching her belly, reuniting their hands where they had been moments before.

He placed his hands on her, their foreheads brushed one against the other.

"I knew you would" he answered, proud of her. "You're the strongest woman I've ever met".

Elena locked her gaze into his.

"I'm the happiest woman in the world, Damon."

She finally eyed the blood that spoilt her shoulder.

"How..?" she stared at him puzzled.

Damon's face grew with concern. "I need you to feed on me".

"It's hurting" she murmured as she touched gently the place where she had hit falling in 1864.

He pulled closer to examine the wound, but his breath was so tempting. It overwhelmed the pain she felt, their love being stronger than anything else existing.

Elena and Damon stared at each other's lips, as he pulled in until they sealed their need into a passionate kiss, their tongues danced together until their souls greeted after the long period of distance.

"Ouch" Elena pulled back when he stroked his cheek against hers. His breath was so tempting, but she was really hurting.

He eyed her, getting the answer the moment he focused his attention on the bruise on her face.


	15. Chapter 15

_**Ohh, so glad I got to share with you guys my knowledge of Bulgarian *Cocky Damon's voice* . **_

_**No but, seriously, I worked hard on this one as it's a passage chapter! So I hope you'll all enjoy and review. It may seem common and unimportant , but reading and getting feedbacks from you keeps me motivated and willing to write better and updating sooner.**_

_**Plus, I couldn't keep this story going without knowing what you guys think.**_

_**So, REVIEW! IT IS APPRECIATION AND LOVE,PEOPLE!**_

* * *

><p><em><strong>Nightmares or imminent events?<strong>_

_Author's POV_

"I guess I've brought with me everything I got back then" Elena stated, staring at the wound on the shoulder.

Damon narrowed his eyes.

"You need to drink my blood" he eyed her under his thick eyelashes.

Elena stopped immediately, sensing an imminent fight at the horizon. Her fingers, that were still brushing slightly on the almost closed signature grew cold at the thought of facing his anger.

"No" she dug in her heels.

Damon had just the reaction she had expected him to get.

"Elena" he called firmly. "I wasn't giving you any option".

He'd tried to hide the hurt in his voice. Did she reject so much drinking from him?

"It may harm the baby" Elena confessed her fear, massaging her belly so slightly that it seemed as if she were afraid to hurt him even with her weak human touch.

Damon's heart had to fill with concern for her actual state.

Instead, the image before his eyes showed so much love that it was too painful to see.

It was the kind of idealized love you read in novels, thinking you'd never see in real life, go figures if experiment that on your own skin.

Elena loved the child inside of her more than any other mother in the world could.

And he was so taken aback from what was occurring, that all he could do was staying silent and learn.

Somebody cleared his throat breaking the atmosphere.

* * *

><p>Both Damon and Elena raised their heads to see Katherine's slim figure lay on the threshold, waiting for a sign from them to let her approach.<p>

"May I?" she demanded, when she figured out none of them was able to speak.

"Leave" was Damon's short cutout.

Elena exchanged confused looks between the two vampires, not getting what had gone on in the brief period of her absence.

"What happened here?" she demanded, aware. Damon had said so many times that he hoped Katherine would bring his younger brother back to life , back to feeling.

Where did this sense of opposition came from?

"She hurt you" Damon hissed, not actually wanting to be so harsh on the girl next to him. "She always does. There's no time when Katherine is out of something that doesn't concern her harming someone. Always in the middle, so desperate to seek some attention."

And with those hurtful words, Elena didn't miss the way her doppelganger's eyes grew full of emotions and regret.

Just when she thought she had seen something sparkling, the vampire's sight went on the floor.

"Katherine" she whispered, as Damon stood up full of more unspoken words and left the room.

Elena followed him to approach her.

* * *

><p>"Katherine" she tried to call lowly the girl before her.<p>

When her dark depths were raised from the ground, all Elena could see was real hurt.

The human stood there, at lack of what her next move should have been.

"I didn't mean to do that to you, or to your baby. And I'm sorry" the vampire apologized.

"It's not about that. " Elena cleared quickly. "I know what Damon said hurt you"

Katherine's eyes squeezed a bit.

"Truth hurts, Elena. Even when you're 500 years old."

"That's because he doesn't know the real truth,and because you've forced yourself to stay away from it for too long. The truth you once told me."

"Don't.." Katherine raised her hands. "Don't try to make him care about me, because after all I did I have no excuses."

"That's where you're wrong, Katherine!" Elena raised her voice, gesturing . "You can't have people love yourself because you're the one in the first place who brings remorse towards your own person!"

Katherine seemed puzzled .

"Do you care?" she asked, reluctant.

And the answer the doppelganger gave was nullifying the distance to hold the vampire into a tight, sincere hug.

* * *

><p>Katherine filled Elena in about what had gone on while her absence, not putting it so straight that she and her ex boyfriend had had sex.<p>

That was something Stefan had to tell her.

When the vampire left the girl to sleep, she catapulted herself downstairs, to look for baby brother.

She would try to talk to him.

She'd essay to make him actually see the real Katherine.

But even faith was regretful.

Stefan was nowhere to be seen in the mansion, and as the young woman headed with her last chance to the parlor, she met the blue eyed brother instead.

"Give me a strong one." Katherine demanded.

* * *

><p>Elena was in her room.<p>

Weird, 'cause she'd been ninety per cent sure she had fallen asleep in Damon's.

Yet, it was too vivid and clear to be a dream.

She could feel the cold night wind blowing in from the open window, the dim light rocking her back and forth as a mother cradled her own child into a resting sleep.

She let my eyes wander in the darkness that quickly obfuscated her sight, finding herself travelling back in time, once again.

Some people's fainted voice arrived from the pile of straw she was curled in, waking her up from a dream she couldn't recall.

Elena looked around, unconsciously knowing she had to be quiet

She realized she didn't even have the further idea whose house was that.

Standing up and making her way to the discovering session, a familiar woman's screams got her .

Those were her own.

The young woman widened her eyes, rushing her pace into this old house made of wooden and poor old furniture.

Looking outside from the wooden curtains, Elena figured out it was late night.

Another shout pierced the air, having her moving unconsciously towards the font of the sound.

When she saw the dim light of the candles coming out from the ajar door, she neared it and peeked into the room.

* * *

><p>Her own eyes couldn't believe the scene happening in front of her person, making her blink so many times to register and send the images to the surprised brain.<p>

Four women were gathered around a low bed, some maids went back and forth changing spoilt cloths with new ones.

One went leaving the dirty material near the door, resting it near Elena's feet, as she soon realized it was blood.

She widened my eyes, trying to see better beyond the astonishment.

All of a sudden, as if an invisible force was pulling her, making her lose the balance, she found herself walking towards the group.

_No! They can see me! _Was all Elena thought.

She wanted to run away, yet curiosity sank in as, nearing the women, she began to see a well known mass of dark ,curly hair.

And just when the human found herself drawn to the mystery, an old woman screamed.

"Още малкъ, скъпa" (a little more, dear) . Elena couldn't understand a word .

She walked one step after the other until she froze in shock.

It was Katherine.

* * *

><p>She was all covered in sweat, and screams left her mouth as somebody knelt before her to support.<p>

She held a young girl's hand and screamed again as who Elena assumed was her mother –the resemblance was too much to deny- motivated her daughter into…

Elena neared more.

_Into giving to birth._

She felt her jaw drop and her heart crumble as she realized at any moment she would have seen Katherine Pierce having a baby.

From where she was standing, she could see it all.

Yet, she couldn't move any further as the flawless face of the baby girl appeared.

Elena let her jaw drop in awe.

* * *

><p>Then it all happened so quickly that she found it hard to understand, if it wasn't for the fact that she already knew how the story was going to end.<p>

Katherine's father appeared from behind her, as if he couldn't see the intrude and ran to tear the baby away from his wife's hands, without even letting the new mother hold her own daughter once.

Elena felt tears run to her eyes, and freely down her cheeks, at the pain she adverted watching the scene before her.

When she tried to wipe away the drops, everything went blank.

* * *

><p>Once she got her sight back, a new different surrounding was around her.<p>

Her real room appeared, and she realized she was laying down in her familiar bed.

All of a sudden, then, Finn and Kol walked in.

She tried to hold back the shouts of terror as she pushed herself back to the headboard.

Just then she figured out whose hands was holding hers.

_Damon's._

But something in the back of her mind couldn't let her rest safe, even if he was next to her.

She felt an aching pain to her belly, as she realized it had grown so much to seem like she was about to give birth.

How could that be possible?

But then Rebekkah came in with blankets and cloths filling her arms, as blood streamed down from between Elena's legs.

"Damon" she screamed in pain, begging him to stop the impossible from happening.

"I'm here,love" he whispered, locking his depths into hers.

Then the pain went away suddenly, and her little baby was out of her, being placed in her arms from her mother Miranda.

Elena widened her eyes wet of tears.

"Mom" she said in such a low voice that she thought she hadn't said it aloud.

"I'm sorry darling" her mother's eyes reflected some twisted pain in it.

Shouldn't she be happy? The baby boy was her grandchildren, after all!

"Let me see him" Elena begged, as she saw the baby being placed in her arms.

Her sight obfuscated from tears of joy.

She forgot everyone around as a new pair of blue eyes seemed to smile at her.

"My baby.." she smiled in awe watching the newborn in her embrace, so small and fragile that she'd give her own soul to save him from danger.

Then a loud noise made her raise her head as she saw Klaus approaching and smiling devilish.

* * *

><p>Katherine lifted her head to the ceiling, listening to the accelerating pace of Elena's heart.<p>

She eyed Damon puzzled, as he stopped from sipping his Whiskey.

When they heard her screaming, it took a half a second for both vampires to fly upstairs.

"Elena!" Damon exclaimed, watching her turning and twisting in the silky sheets.

"NO!" she screamed with her eyes still closed, "Leave him alone!"

Katherine blocked on the threshold, not knowing what to do.

"Wake her up!" she hissed.

"Shut up, I'm trying to!" Damon told back just as sharply, as he bent over his girlfriend.

"Elena, shh!" he pleaded. "It's just a nightmare"

The human finally managed to come back to Earth, looking around as terrified as a deer who had just seen a hunter.

"Damon" she whispered, almost surprised.

"It was just a nightmare" he repeated cupping her head, trying to soothe her.

She had still her eyes widened and her mouth partly open to catch extra needed air .

Her hands went on her belly.

"Klaus" was the only warning she could spit out.


	16. Chapter 16

_**Oh, well! I think I'm glad to see how many of you guys follow this story, and I'm super happy to see how people decide to review to let me know they read the whole thing (along with the previous Endlessly Bound To You) at once!**_

_**So… More Drama/Angst/Action is about to come! Then.. let's have finally our old wanted smut in the fiction! Just let me see you're still out there, reading these lines!**_

_**REVIEW!**_

**Unending mess**

_Author's POV_

"Klaus is dead, Elena" Damon cupped her face, trying to drag her from the dread of the nightmare.

Her sight seemed to be vacant, as if rewindind scenes years distant from the present.

"He's coming back" the human mouthed, finally coming back to Earth just to advert her boyfriend of the imminent danger.

Katherine found even hard to hear the low whisper, Damon approached his face to his girlfriend's.

"No" the painfully handsome face of the blue eyed vampire narrowed, as he placed his hands on her outer arms and shook them firmly. "You listen to me, now".

She had her brown depths dilated and aware of the surroundings, almost afraid of what was coming next.

"He's dead, or at least he's human now. His _family_ thought about that when we saved you. " Damon slowed down the speed of his talking in order for her to focus, as a father talking to his young child.

"He can't come back, Elena. That's the reason in the first place you went back to 1864. You wanted your life back after the disaster, remember?"

She tried to reason as he begged with his multicolor blue depths fixed in her gaze.

But why, in the back of her mind, something pleaded in a sinister way just to entrust her own sensation?

It felt like a prediction.

"It was just a bad dream" he whispered, setting his voice low and soothing, as to cradle her back to sleep.

Damon tucked Elena in, between the silky covers and after he'd kissed her forehead he announced, blurring out from the room: "Gonna get you some water."

Katherine stepped back and remained in the darkness of the hallway in front of the bedroom door the whole time. She watched him coming back.

"Stay" Elena whispered , almost drifting to sleep.

"I'll be right here" he replied, burying his face into the messy dark mass that was her hair.

He crouched down next to her, as she rested her head in the safeness of his chest, soothed by each breath he took.

As Katherine watched the scene in front of her, the back of her enhanced mind travelled the various scenarios with the aftermaths.

Her wisdom was suggesting her they shouldn't have let it drop.

Yet, they couldn't just pop out in the Original's villa and demand them if there was still some debt left to be paid back.

Katherine, though, could sense something was off not about Elena's dream. Rather about _Stefan_.

She shouldn't have played that trick back to 1864. If she hadn't hurt Elena, she wouldn't have finished off in a bed with a doctor checking on her. And Stefan wouldn't have found out about her pregnancy.

And maybe now he wouldn't be gone glooming somewhere she couldn't guess.

It was her fault if Stefan had found out.

It would have been up her to fix it.

"I'm leaving" she whispered, knowing the vampire in the other room would hear her.

"Where to?" Damon raised his head to look in the darkness, picturing her figure there.

"To find Stefan." With that statement she hurried downstairs to pack some stuff .

She didn't know how long she'd be gone.

All of a sudden she felt the air moving behind her, smelling Damon's scent.

"What?" she didn't resist to roll her eyes, ready for one of _his it's-your-fault_ talks.

Damon could be so predictable.

"You sure he left?" he lifted his eyebrow, suspicious.

She seriously thought about it for a second. "I'm not. But if there's any kind of threat still going on out there, I guess Stefan's been too gloomy to worry about it. And exposed himself too much. I hope he simply needs girl support, tough." She sighed silently. "I'm tired of fighting and running."

"Do you know where he is?" a sudden prediction tilted in his twisted mind.

Was this some kind of sneaking out to an unknown city couple thing?

"What?" Katherine asked in unbelief. "I don't, Damon! Why do you always have to be such a dick? "

Those words pronounced by her seemed way too rude.

"That's what you usually do. _Katherine-ish_ stuff, you know. Been there, done that.." Damon explained cocky, yet aware of her every response .

"Yes, and you're the one in the first place who wanted to have a second chance. Are you so selfish to wanting to be the only one able to get it?"

He was puzzled from her outburst, but had himself back soon after. "And how many times are you going to mess things up before you get a second chance done right? Because you know" he paced back and forth, sarcasm hiding anger and hurt. "By then the ones you're after might be far too dead."

"I won't let him die" she said steadily, controlling her voice.

"You're right" he blurred some inches next to her face, threatening her to back down. "Who knows that's one more lie? It's my brother's life here. I won't let you mess up with him any more that you have already done, Katherine."

She bit her lower lip to hold back everything she had inside, clenching her fists. "Screw you". The vampire face began ruining the her stunning features, violet veins tracing deep trails under her reddened eyes, fangs pierced through her inviting mouth.

With that, Katherine was gone.

Damon was in a fit of rage throughout the whole night.

He drank all the left offs of his Whiskey, dwelling on the possibilities of never seeing a day not going in the wrong way again. Not being peacefully happy, loving Elena in every single possible way.

He had just found out he was going to be a father, for heaven's sake! And now he was wondering if his son might ever meet his uncle.

Stefan was hurt, deep down his brotherhood link lead him to admit that to himself.

Damon knew he still loved Elena.

Not in the right, in the sufficient way.. but he did.

Without even considering doing it, he fled to the upper storey, flashing in his own room.

The breath of the girl was even and soothing, and he found himself detached from the world for a good bunch of minutes. She was his safe haven.

Damon shook his head, blurring closely until he could touch her stomach with the tips of his fingers.

"Our baby" he realized out loud, feeling the connection between them coming to something real, as he rewound the images of what made possible what was now so close to come in this world.

Elena dragged him back from his thoughts when she began to stretch out her arms and legs.

Her hand fell unconsciously on her belly, where soon there would have been a bump.

"Damon" she murmured, acknowledging his presence when their fleshes met.

"Hey there" he greeted, covering up the husky voice gotten from all the drinking and not talking for a long time.

"What time is it?" she demanded, when her eyes slowly opened to face another day.

"Early. Six in the morning" he realized she'd have never woken up at this time on her own. "Is something wrong?"

She processed for one good minute before talking. "Promise me if I tell you this you won't start to doubt my theories."

"Elena, when ever have I doubt anything you say?" he rolled his eyes with impatience.

She gave him an accusatory glance, to stress the unspoken answer.

"You always complain anything that goes against your opinions" she muttered, matter-of-factly.

"Well" he shrugged, not able to controvert. "You love me the same" his cocky smile appeared along with his sarcasm.

She kept the giggle to herself, reminding how much she'd missed this facet of him.

But before she even started to talk, a contact between them was made when their lips crashed hard one against the other.

How much had she missed this?

She let him explore her mouth, twisting her fingers in the hair at the base of his neck, realizing he was letting them grow up, and smiled at the thought in the meanwhile.

He caressed her cheeks, her neck, her arms, and began kissing her collarbone, as she let out soft moans of pleasure.

"Don't distraught me" she pleaded.

"Spit it out" he was back on the plan-in-action mode.

Elena began telling him about her dream, raising her index finger to shut Damon up whenever he would try to interrupt, until she got to her point.

"I think it's not just a dream." She stated, serious. "It's not like any sensation I've ever had before. It felt so vivid, so ..Bonnie Bennett .."

Damon didn't laugh at the remark. Instead he tried to give himself some kind of acceptable answers.

"When did it start?"

Elena was left in peace with her thoughts, until she blurt out " When I realized I had the baby".

_In the meanwhile…_

Katherine had prepared herself for the worst when she had crossed the threshold of the luxurious villa Klaus' family was said to reside in.

She wouldn't have knocked if it was any other kind of vampires, but with these ones… All she could do was behave. So not her attitude.

"Come in" a female voice announced from somewhere close inside.

Katherine took a deep breath, trying to pull back her wildest instinct to take off and run far, far away.

She was doing this for Stefan.

"I believe an unexpected guess has arrived" said a blonde woman in her fifities , classy and elegant.

Her strong English accent ,the most evident Katherine had ever heard in 500 years ,brought back memories of the time when all of it had started, in England, when she'd met Klaus.

"I'm here to peacefully ask an information" the young vampire announced, keeping a safe distance in between herself and the woman, who she supposed, from her heartbeat, was human.

Yet the power she emanated was strong enough to make all of the hair on Katherine's neck stand.

"And I formally guess it is exactly what I have been expected." The stranger had now a smile on her lips. "Stefan, I suppose?"

Katherine tried not to flinch too much when she realized she had gotten it right at the first try.

Stefan was involved in all this.

"You do suppose well" her manners were still covered with dust, but she had quickly taken control over it.

"Well, follow me" the lady proposed , leading the way into a dark room down the stairs of the first storey.

"Oh my God" Katherine muttered when she saw the unmoving body of her lover on the floor of a dark cellar .

She didn't get in, though.

If it was some kind of wrecked plan.. She didn't want to be a part of it any more than she already was.

"Do you even think we wouldn't have had the chance to acknowledge what has been going on?"

Katherine narrowed her eyes, turning to the woman behind her.

"What are you talking about?"

"My children have been taking tracks of the human doppelganger. Now that the curse is broken, any random vampire could use Elena, I suppose, to make more hybrids."

She widened her eyes to express better the concept ." What Klaus was is an abomination . I can't allow that to happen again."

The vampire still wasn't getting where the conversation would have lead them, so she opted for straight questions. She was already taken much aback at the fact that this person in front of her claimed to be the Original's mother.

"What are you going to do with her?"

The witch didn't miss how protective the subject had turned the fugitive doppelganger.

That was something that would have been in their favor .

"No more descendants of the Petrova line can be created. This process has to stop."


	17. Chapter 17

**So. **

**Just one more chapter.. And we're almost done with the drama.**

**You do want me to focus on Delena, don't you? **

**Let me know, cause I'm open to all initiatives!**

**Love the ones who follow the story, would buy a personal Ian to all the ones who review!**

**So… What are you waiting for?**

**REVIEWS ARE IAN! **

_**Let the nightmare begin**_

Damon tossed his phone on the expensive golden couch of the parlor, while a rude curse left loudly his lips.

"She should have called, by now!" his voice was anything but controlled, making Elena flinch and curve her shoulders while her figure was silently sat on his leather chair.

_Please don't let him crash down _was what was filling her mind up.

She was enough nervous herself to channel enough mental strength to cool him.

.

Damon approached the big window wall that faced the back porch , actuating his usual soothing method , focusing on her heart beat to steady the pace of his urgent thoughts.

He realized ,though, that her heart was pounding like a newborn's one in her chest, as her breaths were held back in her mouth.

Damon narrowed his eyes to blur near her the next second, kneeling and resting his hands into her lap, protectively cupping hers.

"I'm sorry" he apologized, his cold fires burning into the warmth of hers. "Are you both okay?"

"What if they're hurt?" Elena ignored the question about her health to focus on the two vampires out there that meant more than any other in the world, except Damon of course.

Her voice was low and husky.

.

He took some seconds to process the possible scenarios, not giving away any of his emotions, thanking the fact that his usual walls were so well built to resist any kind of external storm.

"I guess we'll.." he began, but the noise of the front door swinging open made both the lovers jump off.

.

.

.

Elena and Damon waited still for the rhythmic patter of high heels to approach them, both knowing whose it was going to be.

The moment Katherine's slim figure emerged from the huge ajar doors, they couldn't take any sigh of relief, because the announce made , had the nightmare started.

"They have Stefan"

.

.

.

Damon didn't waste one second to stand and rush in front of her, his blue eyes smoldering and craving for explanations .

"What happened?"

Katherine's gaze was vacant and lost. "I should have known." She whispered.

Elena's heart crumpled, releasing twinges that she tried to ignore as she approached her twin.

"I went at their mansion. Nobody was there, though. Just the mother. She introduced herself and then.."

"Mother what?" Damon blurt out, sharply. "Thought she was dead! Klaus killed her thousands years ago!"

Katherine was still emotionless.

"Let her talk" Elena reprimanded him so coldly that it had them both turned to check in her way.

The human gestured her doppelganger to continue.

"Then I don't remember anything else. I just know Stefan's locked up in a basement, Damon. He's in danger".

Her voice went all of a sudden charged with what could be easily called hopelessly.

"We need to free him" Katherine swiftly had herself back, stating the sentence convinced.

"No, you listen to me now." Damon was menacing "Make yourself useful and start by sitting down here and not talk, move or anything. " he spat bitterly. "I'm going to find _my brother_, get him back. And you're looking after Elena." He backed her off with his own chest.

Then rushed out of the parlor, only to be stopped by a thought he could not held back, on his way to the threshold.

"The moment I'm back you're out of our lives, forever." His detached threat sounded like a solemn oath.

.

In that exact moment Damon's phone chirped.

He picked it up, puzzled. The number was unknown to him.

"Hello?"

"Well, hello my dear." A female voice seemed too sure of herself to Damon's acute hearing.

He stood up straight, in alert.

Something was off.

Katherine's expression changed as well, evidently not expecting this.

"Who are you?" the eldest Salvatore demanded.

"My name is Esther Mikaelson ." the woman greeted, in the strongest British accent Damon had ever heard. "I believe we do possess something you own here. Stefan, is that correct?"

Damon froze before his mind could even make the connections.

He observed as Katherine's expression went pale. "Klaus" she mouthed urgent.

"What do you want with him?" Damon tried to ignore the warning just in order to keep his voice composed.

"I personally want nothing with the young man, but surely I will always protect my family from all threads."

"Oh c'mon!" Damon couldn't hold back his anger more. "He's nothing but a thread for bunnies"

Katherine neared him even more, gesturing for him to be quiet and quit with the attitude.

He gestured back to shut up.

Elena watched the whole scene with the heart stuck in her throat.

.

"It is not your young brother I am talking about. But I shall not free him until you and my children have some affairs discussed."

He knew there was no point in objecting.

And he was actually willing to end the call to discuss with the most evil bitch in front of him of what was going on.

Didn't she always knew one thing or two, Katherine ?

"Fine. Meet me where?"

"The witches' house, as soon as you are able to get there."

.

And with that she hung up.

….

"What the hell was that?" he swore after his sentence, directly to the woman before him.

Katherine replied, not wasting a second."That was the original witch."

"Are you fucking kidding me?" Damon blurt out. " I thought she was dead."

"So did one hour ago. We need to get him out of this mess."

"She'll want something in bargain ." Damon stated,obvious. "Who's gonna die next,uh?" he thought aloud, pacing nervously back and forth.

"I'm coming with you". Katherine ignored what he had just spat out, not accepting rejections.

"No way, Katherine." He stopped his nervous walking to look at her, his eyes revealing exasperation. "Elena needs protection".

"Call Caroline and Bonnie." She replied ,pissed off .

"I'm gonna need the witch. Caroline's too young." he told back, heading out, decided to get things done as soon as possible.

"I swear to God, Katherine" he adverted her once on the doorstep . "Do this wrong and I'm gonna tear you apart limb to limb. She's your family. I guess you don't wanna do the same mistake you did with your own daughter."

With devil in his eyes, he left her emotionless, pouring salt on her aching wound.

.

.

.

Katherine stood still, in silent, rewinding the words that had just filled the already tense air.

"_Do the same mistake you did with your own daughter". _

How could he say that? After how hard she had tried to fix her mistakes, how could he open that drawer that knew shouldn't have even been touched?

How?

She wasn't even capable of thinking about anything else, pain being too powerful after being repressed for all those years to be hold back.

She made it in time to blur upstairs and lock herself in the bathroom.

…

When Katherine made sure she was alone, the supernatural strength that made her stand lacked and had her falling on the ground with a deaf thumb.

She placed one hand on her long dead heart, digging her sharp fingers into her chest.

She wanted to rip out all of her sufferance .

_My baby. My little girl._

The only thing that had kept my humanity alive, yet hidden behind a thick wall of murders and pain infliction, was the love for her daughter, even if nobody would have ever known that.

Who knew where she had gone that damned day.

If she had died right there, right then, would she ever be able to see her breath taking beautiful and innocent face, somewhere?

.

Maybe, if her _ own_ soul was going to be blessed enough to go somewhere after death.

She'd have been able to hold her little girl, to revenge that time that was stolen .

Katherine cried after a century and a half because she was hurt.

She was hurt because a part of her had been ripped apart merciless, and then burnt to ashes.

.

.

.

Elena was numb for a couple of minutes.

What Damon had told Katherine was beyond cruel. If she was suffering for her, go figure what the vampire upstairs was going through.

But the back of her mind was telling her off, because deep down Elena was aware that he was just scared to death.

He was risking to lose his brother, for God's sake!

…

With that though in mind she made her way to the upper storey, sure of having heard Katherine headed to the bedrooms.

When she was about to reach the corridor, though, the faint noise of disguised sobs made her stand in her way in pain.

She stayed quiet for some seconds, as one tear traced down her cheek, lonely.

Every fiber of herself could absorb the ache that composed the sound coming from the room before her.

With no more hesitation, Elena grabbed an old piece of torch used for the furniture and sharply crashed it against the wooden door.

"Katherine!" she called after her, aware no answer would've been given.

At her third tentative the creepy squeak let her know she had succeeded.

.

.

.

"Oh my God" was what Elena could murmur when the image in front of her was visible.

Katherine was knelt down on the floor, her face buried in her hands, her shoulder moving uncontrollably from the sobs her body released.

Never before, the human had seen a vampire crying like that.

She would have never thought out of everyone she knew, Katherine could manage to do that.

Instinctively Elena fled on the floor next to her, placing her arms around the vulnerable one.

"Shh" she tried to soothe.

She knew too well those tears came from the harsh words received just a little while ago.

"I'm so sorry,Kat."

.

.

.

"No way" Katherine murmured some minutes later, freezing deadly in her doppelganger's hug.

Elena backed off, to stare and understand what she meant.

"She's here" Katherine replied so low that she almost mouthed the advert .

Then her vampire mode went on again, as she hurried to stand and place herself in front of Elena.

When the figure of the woman appeared,rounding the corner, the human swallowed hard her bile back in her throat .

"We meet again" Esther smiled widely.

.

.

.

"Why can't I remember anything?" Katherine tried to buy time, hopelessly because she knew she could face no fight against the resuscitated witch before her.

"That is something we can adjust " the threat announced, beginning to speak the same language Elena recognized being used from Bonnie.

"No!" Katherine's scream pierced the air, causing Elena to fall on her knees watching the scene before her.

"Let her go!"

The vampire fell on the floor for the unbearable pain shooting daggers in her brain.

Katherine held her head tight, screaming, and pleading the witch to make the pain stop.

…

When it did, she recalled everything.

"No.." Katherine stopped, exchanging gazes from the witch to Elena. "You can't do that!"

Elena backed off, her human instincts strong enough to let her know she had to run away.

To do what she should have done one year ago.

"Do what?" she whispered, her hands placed instinctively on the dearest place to her of her body.

The witch's expression cringed for a short second, as the doppelganger seemed unable to look elsewhere from the threat.

"I am sorry, Elena. But we all have lost our dearest blood related ones. "

And with that, it all went blank.


	18. Chapter 18

_**Hello world!**_

_**So here I am, back with a new chapter and a pretty great playlist to listen while reading this.**_

_**BSB – Something That I Already Know .com/watch?v=9sWsynoJC00&feature=related**_

_**Alex Band – Only One .com/watch?v=bl-0D2M_VNk **_

_**Then of course, thank you to every single one who reviewed, and I need to tell you guys, this is what keeps me from leaving this story uncompleted . **_

_**YOUR SUPPORT IS LOVE.**_

_**Waiting for more feedbacks for this chapter! What's gonna be of Delena?**_

_**IMPORTANT:**_

_**Don't forget to read the first chapter of my new story, Face Down .**_

_**.net/s/7871195/1/Face_Down**_

_**Stefan begins beating/raping Elena because of his bloodlust,over time turned into his undead crave for Katherine. Elena can't stop it, because she's only human. And Damon won't see it,not until it may be too late.**_

_**Unforgivable Sins**_

Elena woke up with a startle, reminiscing and processing during her faintness what cruelly bitter destiny the future had reserved for both her and her baby.

"No" she leaped up, urgent.

.

Taking in her surroundings, she realized she wasn't alone.

.

The somber and sinister room –which she recognized as the witches' house- was rendered even more sullen by slim figures standing on the line of the beginning of the dim light, dark enough for her weak human sight not to be able to tell who was who.

"Elena" a desperate voice called from behind. One breath was blocked on its way in her throat when she turned and saw Damon.

.

His expression was a rush of expressions way miles distant from happiness or relief.

And that was only the last straw to all of her hopes, and they burnt suddenly like the leaves of a tree struck by a lightning.

.

His oceans were in the coldest colors of all.

"What's happening?" she asked, her voice trembling.

.

He wanted to appear next to her and reassure her from all of her fears, to tell her that it was gonna be okay, just like he had done every time she would be miserable about any issue bothering her messed up life.

But out of all the things he could do,_ lying_ to Elena was definitely not in the list.

.

This time, there wasn't going to be an happy ending.

.

.

.

He stared in her hazelnuts puddles, his jaw drop, lacking the will to find any more words.

Giving in, he appeared on her side, as she hid her face in the crook of his neck, breathing him in.

.

Damon placed his hands on her belly, and locked his gaze with hers.

_His baby. Her son._

He couldn't bear the thought of losing either of them.

.

Why couldn't his life allow him more than some minutes in row of happiness?

.

Why did it have to be so complicated?

With the kiss they exchanged, their connected souls expressed what they weren't able to do with words.

This was a _goodbye_.

.

.

.

"Enough, young lovers" the voice Elena recognized being as Esther's broke their private bubble they were plunged into.

Elena fixed her gaze on the woman making her way through the shadows of her sons, standing in the only spot enlightened by the rays of the moon in the centre of the room.

.

"I guess you wish to know what is going to be of all this preparation".

.

Elena clenched her jaw, along with her fists.

Damon held her closer.

"Where are the others?" she tried to deflect, being given an answer in the same exact moment.

.

Stefan and Katherine showed themselves from the opposite side of the thread in front of the two.

Her ex boyfriend was silent, the vampire doppelganger slightly shook her head, her eyes sympathetic.

.

Elena knew it was now or never.

"I'm sorry Stefan"

He squinted his eyes, clenching his jaw in response.

"I've loved you. A part of me always will. And I will never ever regret a second we've been together"

Elena stood up, ignoring everything around her, and approached the man who once was all of herself.

She put one hand on his cheek, as he tried to look away, she forced his green depths to be fixed into hers.

"I've made so many things to hurt you, but I _care_ about you,_ Stefan_. So much that you'd never except it. I guess all of this has happened for a reason. Something wanted to show us who we belonged to."

Her teary eyes pointed at her twin next to him.

.

Katherine's brown puddles were now filled of rain.

"I'll never forget you, Elena. " he held back a sob, referring to the woman who once meant all of his world. "You need to remember that."

She nodded, on the edge of bursting out crying. "I know. And you shouldn't. Never forget me, wherever we'll end up after this".

And after a pause, she greeted him goodbye. "I'll never forget you, either, Stefan."

She leaned him, so close, as his cologne brought back to her mind sharp memories, happy times, laughter.

The first time that they met, when she thought she would have just given up her new crush, because she had to focus on the mourning of her parents.

The moment she realized Stefan was the solid cliff she was hanging to in order not to fall in a cold ocean of pain.

Their first night together.

The moment she realized she had to let him go.

.

All those memories molded before her closed eyes, as they wetted more and more with nostalgic drops .

"Thank you" she whispered, before hesitating next to his bare skin, waiting for a permission that was quickly given.

.

He held her tight, as if the movie of their life together was being aired in front of them and they were telling each other their last goodbye.

.

.

.

When it was time, she pulled away, fixing in her memory the sight of his eyes.

"You're welcome" he murmured, touched.

.

She turned to check on the witch in the middle of the room, realizing she was occupied with the rituals a spell would require.

.

She still had time left.

.

"Katherine" she called, shaking her from a train of deep thoughts.

Damon, in the meanwhile, swore to himself this was the gloomiest moment of his life.

His sympathetic eyes didn't miss Katherine's focused expression, and raised his dark eyebrow.

Sure as hell, she was up to something.

He knew her way too well to accept the thought of Katherine Pierce giving up.

.

"Elena" Damon called her in a tone full of meaning.

She turned, and saw him approaching the three in a second.

"What are they gonna do?"she asked, but was quickly interrupted.

.

"I am deeply sorry, Elena." Esther began. "But when your friend Bonnie casted the spell to get you back in time, what you and Damon procreated is not allowed to survive in this word."

Elena gasped, and protected her belly with her weak hands.

.

To everybody's astonishment, Stefan stood his way before her, and Damon followed.

Katherine was the only one to remain still.

"Please" Elena whispered ,pleading. "You're a mother. You can understand how it feels. Don't do this to me."

"Your sons are the first abomination ever existed. " Damon blurt out, mad. "And now you're wandering around the possibilities of my son to be a monster?"

Elena tried to ignore the squeeze in her heart at his words. She had just called her baby _his son._

"You don't even know the baby is going to be a thread" Elena stated, sure of herself. "When I travelled back in time Damon was human. That makes him fully human."

.

Esther shook her head, hiding a bitter smirk.

"I can feel the power he emanates from where I stand. " a brief pause. "If this is not supernatural, well you should reconsider _the meaning_ of the word."

Elena was taken aback, and realized what the unexplainable precognitions she was having in her nightmares.

It had been the baby, all along.

And she knew she couldn't object anymore.

.

"Approach, Elena" was the order that was given to her.

She looked at Damon, he felt his soul shatter.

His hand sought desperately for hers.

"_I'll never leave you again"_ were the words echoing in replay in her mind, the night it had all began.

.

It was time that something major then their love would break the promise.

.

"I'm not going to leave your side" he whispered , stroking his forehead against hers.

"I.. I don't wanna lose the baby. Not after everything I went through." she blurt out, her trembling hands went on her still flat belly.

He cupped her face in his hands.

"I can't, Damon!"

Ashes couldn't be glued together like the pieces of her once smashed heart. Not even Damon would have been able to mold what was soon going to be set in a destroying fire.

Of that, she had no doubts.

.

"I want you to kill me" she announced, no fear tracing in her voice, when she spoke to the witch.

Damon thought he had misunderstood, but when he saw Esther nodding, he realized her words had been perfectly sharp razors that cut his thick skin,passing through the indestructible walls that only the woman in his embrace could erase.

.

"Elena.." his voice was unstable , lacking begs. "Don't do this to me."

Elena saw some tears stream down his face, making it even harder to let him go.

"I'll love you forever." She sobbed.

.

She unlocked their twisted fingers, releasing in the same moment what she thought were the binds that tied them together.

_Love._

_Passion._

_Desire._

_Pain._

_Purity._

.

.

.

Standing in the middle of the room, she felt her blood grow colder, wondering how it would have been like to leave this Earth.

When she was little, she was told many times heaven existed .

But after having been spoilt by so much pain and death.. Could her sins be forgiven?

.

The distant eyes of the witch were shining with sinister power, as she announced. "Let 's begin".

.

When she began to chant the spell, Elena could feel every inch of her body weaken, from the tip of her toes, to her ankles, to her knees… Slowly making her drift away, this time to never come back.

.

Damon stood numb for one good minute, unable to process or do something near the coherence .

When he saw her helplessly standing in the centre of the torture, alone, that's when his instincts tilted.

She was slowly losing her strength , he could see her shoulders cringing as she fell on the floor.

.

He was the one to catch her.

"I'm right here" he whispered in her ear, as she fought to keep her eyes open.

It seemed like a déjà-vu, in Georgia, when he'd saved her life.

This time, though, there was no escape route.

"Focus, Elena" he suggested, authoritarian .

She didn't want to lose one second of his purely handsome face, so she did as she was asked.

She used all of her last strength to channel the ability of staring into this endless oceans .

That was going to be the last thing she'd have seen.

.

He knew it was nearing the end.

And had no more time to lose.

"You need to kill me too" he begged. "At least that, you should concede me." Was the demand retorted .

Esther stared at the two without speaking, making no sign of agreement.

.

.

.

.

.

It was somebody else to break the dead silence.

"You're jealous" Katherine blurt out, bitter.

Everybody's eyes fled on her, goggling.

"That would explain why you're trying to kill the baby. Because we tried to kill yours, and you can't bear the sight of the family you wished you could have. Because your husband never really treated you the way Damon does with her. Because yours wasn't true love, and you cheated on him with the werewolf."

The revelation appeared to be assimilated by Katherine herself in the same moment she pronounced the words.

She gestured to explain herself better with her index finger. "Because you loved that man. You wanted a life with him but you had to protect your sons. And now you're taking away Elena's baby because you're not _strong_ enough to kill the abominations you have created."

.

And then the longest silence in history was what rendered the air thick and unbearable the next few minutes.

Nobody dared to talk.

Not even Esther.


	19. Chapter 19

_Maybe one of the most intense chapters I've ever written._

_It took me three days to write this, and in the meanwhile I was typing I got a bit emotional. Well, I hope I've worked good enough for you to feel and get my point of view of this story._

_This chapter has a "weird" twist in it. But I felt like it worked so good and was something out of the "fantasy" that some of you may have enjoyed. _

_So.. Enjoy!_

_P.S. _

_My soundtrack suggestion ( A little unusual, I know. Just trust my tastes in music : _

_**Amazing Grace – Leann Rimes**_** .com/watch?v=iT88jBAoVIM**

**Freedom – Run Kid Run .com/watch?v=5ViXe3xTwcU **

_**Hopes light up**_

.

.

.

The seconds flowed quickly one after the other, each ticking on the clock carrying away with itself the different endings of the marked destinies of the beings in the room.

Damon's ice stare was fixed unmoving on the powerful witch's eyes, warm as caramel yet menacing worse than death.

He had been killed once, _hadn't he_?

The physical passage he'd gone through was something that had seemed unbearable at the begging. He'd gotten over it,though. 145 years had been enough to get time to process it.

Losing Elena,instead, meant the sudden fade of his soul.

Because she was his essence, the core of his being.

And in the lack of that, you could stop existing. There was no way out.

.

If the dim light of hope showing in Esther's hesitation was equal to begging to be set free, well than that's what he would do.

He had to give it all to save_ his_ Elena.

"Please" his voice was impregnated with plea and desperation . "Let her live. "

Something in his arms shook uncontrollably, as he soon realized it was just the human he loved crying out her soul.

But he could not allow his guard down. And watching her pain would have only made his last strength stumble.

.

She wanted to spend her last seconds hating herself.

Hating the choices that had lead her where she was. Because it all brought back to her faults .

.

How could she be so selfish to want a baby in this world? How could she let the life inside of her be.. be.. . nullified ?

It couldn't happen. It just couldn't.

.

Elena had never actually been the type who'd pray or believe in God's power.

She remembered the days back to her childhood ,when her father used to bring her to the small Church in town every Saturday morning.

He'd stare at the dim colored light passing through the windows of the bare altar and lose himself deeply in thoughts.

She recalled the one time when Grayson told her never to lose her hopes. And whenever later in life she would have thought everything would be lost… She'd be mistaking.

She'd be wrong, because God was there waiting for her pray.

"_He'll listen to the pureness that comes from the bottom of your heart."_ She replayed the memory in her mind, her father stroking gently her cheek. _"God never leaves his children alone."_

.

And with that, she prayed to God to save her unspoilt child. The one who was now going to pay for her mother's mistakes.

She simply prayed.

.

"God Please save him" the whispers leaving Elena's mouth caught even the coldest hearts. "My baby, save him!"

Tears found their way down to her squeezed eyes.

"Take him away" she rocked her body back and forth, joining her hands together "But don't make him suffer."

"My baby.." she opened her eyes, seeking for an invisible vision appearing through the dim and light rays illuminating the small room.

She let her knees on the floor, and cringed on herself.

"Save him, God."

.

**{A.N. / Play the second song }**

**.**

Rebekkah, Elijah .

They were simply astounded by the power emanating by the love of a mother.

The easiest, purest kind of love.

The one that each one of them had somehow proved on their skins, and in some twisted,personal way missed more than everything.

But this was nothing to be compared to what, in their endless existences, had ever assisted or received.

.

Elena's prayers were what exposed and face them to what made them understand it was wrong.

There was no more doppelganger.

No more threat to destroy in order to feel safe and powerful.

Just a desperate,young mother craving for the life of his baby to be saved.

.

Elena couldn't explain why she felt so attracted to the dim light coming down from the broken roof.

She just followed it,never stopping begging for salvation, perhaps just as if it was the thing that could have actually spared the life of her child.

.

She looked at it,fighting and winning against the urge her body had to release salty teardrops.

Her gaze was fixed on the million shades of white the light emanated, feeling her body detach from the situation in the room to focus on what soon after appeared.

"M..Mom?" Elena let the figure before her mold the slightest smile of all, as the girl became utterly astonished by the greatness of her mother's grace.

"Hope, Elena" the whisper the image released warmed the human's heart, as she realized how familiar her mother's voice still was.. even one year after her death.

But what mostly it wanted to show was something else.

Before Elena even realized that… It all blurred away, flinging her sharply back to the deadly misery of the situation that was soon going to be ended.

.

.

.

"Stop,mother!" Elijah's voice got everybody's gaze unmoving from his face.

"This is wrong…" Rebekkah let out as a realization, approaching Esther, to then eye Elena sympathetically .

"She's done nothing wrong." The blonde beauty confirmed, placing her slim figure just right in front of the human .

"Let her be" Elijah's tone was cold. "We'll deal with the problem when it will present itself. Right now we have no certainty the new life could be a threat."

Damon had his jaw tensed.

" And even if he will.. " Elijah blocked any of his upcoming reactions. "They would never let the baby be a source of blood for supernatural creations."

.

Everyone's looks became one single hope, an unsteady thread wandering on the sharp edges of a razor, as the haunted girl's destiny hung with angst on the witch's decision.

Elena pleaded her with her gaze.

Damon felt the physical need of having her in his arms one last time.

Blurring behind her, he threw his hands around her waist, breathing in and fixing her unique scent inside of his memory.

She turned to face him.

No words capable of bearing so many feelings could come out. And they didn't speak, afraid their last voiced fears would have been any where near a goodbye.

Both of Damon and Elena didn't have the courage to say those words.

.

"Leave this place." Esther's monotonous tone was low, barely audible. Yet enough to raise everybody's hopes up.

It took one second for Damon to process the unexpected shift of big finale, causing his jaw to almost drop on the ground.

When he saw Elijah's shoulders relax, he quickly assumed that what he'd just heard wasn't just some kind of twisted trick his mind had played and formulated on its own.

He profited of a swift movement to check on his brother standing behind him, showing an expression just as astonished as his .

Stefan was exchanging glances between his eldest relative and the mirrored images of the women he'd both loved.

.

The blue eyed Salvatore didn't miss his chance to make sure it wasn't a trap.

He couldn't risk it all. He couldn't let his guard down. Not even for a second.

Not when it came to the life of Elena or their son.

_Their_ son…

.

"Thank you" he whispered,in a moderate yet attentive tone.

Esther seemed to be drawn back from a mental contact her gaze had elaborated on Elena's.

He felt the need to hold her tight, shaking her back to Earth.

"I have a condition, before giving your _freedom_ back."

The statement had everyone's spine run cold with chilling shudders.

"What is it?" Stefan swiftly demanded, knowing Damon's composure wasn't something to be proved or underestimated.

And his eldest brother mentally thanked him.

Because right in the situation he was in… He'd have thrown himself on the witch. He'd had everything screwed up.

Elena adverted the shift in his weight, and placed her arms around his broad shoulders.

"My family and I will come around." Esther eyed carefully each one of the enemies. "No matter where. No matter what."

Then a brief pause,in which her golden glance went to be fixed coldly on the ice depths of Damon's. "I rely on you three vampires to protect the baby. If any threat will ever succeed to create one more hybrid… Even just one…"

There was a short moment where everybody waited for the final words to be spoken. "You'll all be dead. Doppelganger included."

.

Damon clenched his hands onto the ground, and it was the only movement he made.

If he'd let himself to do something.. even just breathing.. He was sure he'd have exploded .

.

Katherine was the one to speak for them, since either they were too dumbstruck or had the adrenaline joking with their nerves.

The 500 years of coldness saved the she vampire. "We'll make sure of that."

.

And with one last glance Esther dismissed the hostages.

"You can now leave."

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

_**BIG SHOUTOUT TO :**_

_**.Delena**__** ,**__**Jessieheath101**__** , **__**Lizardkingsgirl**__** , **__**pannybaby123**__** , **__**cdaye8184**__** , **__**LovingDamon4Ever**__** ,**__**kasikl20**__** , NinaRules , **__**HelloBrother**__** , **__**amikins**__** , **__**Lily Hladky**__** , **__**IrisOfTheNight**__** , **__**AprilViolet**__** .**_

_**I READ EVERY SINGLE REVIEW AND ANSWER THEM BACK, APPREACIATING AND ADORING THEM ALL.**_

_**SORRY IF I FORGOT TO MENTION SOMEONE, BUT I'M THANKING YOU ALL GUYS FOR BEING SUCH AN INSPIRATION AND STRENGTH TO KEEP ON WRITING !**_

_**.**_

_**THANK YOU SO MUCH. **_


	20. Chapter 20

_**I'm really sorry for the delay, but I've had troubles with my laptop and stuff to get over with at school. It's the last few months before summer break, and I have to give my best in order not to waste all of the efforts I've made! So , forgive me people!**_

_**Hope the chapter's good enough to make you love and follow me again!**_

_**.  
><strong>_

_**Summary: **_

_**Esther appears and wants to end Elena's life, since it's linked to a new one, the one of hers and Damon's baby. It's something never experimented before, an abomination. **_

_**And the witch wants to end it, because of the experience with Klaus and his being hybrid.**_

_**But Elena's faith is stronger. The love of a mother is.**_

_**And it saved them all. **_

_**Let's see where it takes the story!**_

.

.

* * *

><p>.<p>

.

_**Hopes can still exist in the darkness**_

.

Her eyes had been free to wander on the random blank patterns of the ceiling up on their heads, rewinding the grand finale aired only a few hours before.

It seemed unreal, how suddenly roads could twist and turn, disappear and lead you into the complete blackness. But it was as much of an unbelievable fact the way hopes could still exist in the darkness.

They were _alive_.

Just like the promise Elena had assured Damon one month before, that night when they'd locked gazes next to the hot flames of the fireplace, the closest thing able to concretise their love.

A dangerous passion.

Something that could burn to death the ones who tried to overcome and tame it, but powerful enough to survive through it all.

.

_She had stood there numb, emotionless . _

_The witch in front of Elena couldn't be harmless. She couldn't just let them go. Not like that. Not that easily. Not all of a sudden._

_Or… had it really happened? Did Esther just set them free? Had her prayers to God been enough? Had her mother Miranda listened to Elena's implorations?_

_._

_Katherine walked past the couple on the spot, nearing carefully the exit door._

_A suspicious look was given to the elements of the thread, who fortunately didn't seem to object, then those ageless brown depths stopped on the frame of her human doppelganger._

_Elena was standing with a vacant look focused on Esther, her lower lip trembled for an unknown feeling to Katherine's eyes._

_What the girl had just accomplished went beyond any human's power. _

_What Katherine had just seen made her regret how little she had fought to have her baby girl left with her, back in Bulgaria many years before. It was nothing, compared to Elena's strength. _

_._

_And she was all what Katherine wished she could be._

"_Take her away" was the eldest Petrova's silent but firm order. _

_Katherine just wanted to leave, to go to sleep and forget what her death had almost been like._

_She wanted to close her eyes and awake in Stefan's arms. Like she had promised him before the long night had started. _

_Maybe she could have gotten her long lost love back. She owed that all to the human who had now become her family._

_._

_Damon had shown to be the man that Katherine had never dreamed about having a concrete existence on Earth._

_And at the same time, the aching need of being loved in the same way that Elena was, overwhelmed her._

_It wasn't jealousy . It was simply a twinged necessity._

_._

"_Damon" Katherine called him again, swearing in her mind on the ability of the eldest Salvatore of screwing things up in a matter of seconds._

_Indeed, the human side of the man - the one filled with heavy feelings and uncontrollable emotions- fastidiously screamed for attention._

_Need of revenge. Pain. Rage._

_All things Damon had never actually been able of shutting back off. _

_._

_He craved for the death of Esther, of the Originals, of his own self. For hurting Elena so deeply, for depriving her of the purity and happiness she was once full of._

_For tearing selfishly everything away from her, because of all the efforts the love for his person required her._

_What could he do, to pay Elena back? Love her with all of himself, destroying his very soul to show she meant the salvation of him?_

_Already done._

_And right now, he couldn't be impulsive. He couldn't hurt her any more._

_._

_He couldn't kill Esther. He couldn't kill himself. _

_He simply had to silently bear this great misery. He had to embrace it and try to take on the one of the young woman just before him all along. _

.

"_Let's go" he whispered, cradling her feather weighting body in his arms._

_The sensation the contact started was his heaven. He'd been saved all along._

_The moment his eyes had met the ones of Elena Gilbert._

_._

_And she, she could smell nothing but Damon. _

_She could hear nothing but the deaf sounds her body made against his, the way the tears-stained cheeks met his chest. The way he breathed in the unforgettable scent that he thought she had. _

_And she willingly lost herself in the moment, while Damon carried her away drawing her out of that place. _

_Funny, the thought of being saved by the darkness itself._

_Elena hid her face in the crook of his neck, closing her eyes._

_._

_._

* * *

><p><em>.<em>

_._

_Once out of the farmhouse, Stefan turned on his back one last time to gladly say goodbye to the place that might have been his last memory._

_Saving Elena had been the most difficult thing he'd ever experienced in his existence. _

_Mostly because she didn't want to be saved. _

_A bitter grin appeared on his lips, which had been set in a tense line for too long._

_._

_He remembered how much that attitude of hers got him to the point of doubting about her mental health. Oh well, that's what the so call stubbornness is about. _

_And Elena was full of it._

_And headstrong enough to put herself against the vampire hundreds times her age just to save the ones she loved._

_That selfless, reckless little human._

_But..How selfish had it been of her to think her death, which almost occurred twice every week in the past year, wouldn't have affected all the ones around her?_

_Losing Elena would have killed everybody._

_For that only reason, she had kept on struggling. She had kept her head held high, that crooked expression filled of proud and strong will when she folded her arms around her chest, convincing everybody she'd everything under control._

_How much he'd loved her._

_._

_But this new life carried inside of her had changed her perspective of the world._

_She couldn't let herself die without carrying her baby all along._

_And the thought of her pain, once fully set in that scenario, a few minutes before, had ripped Stefan's soul apart._

_._

_If that 13__th__ of September 2010 he just wouldn't have shown up at the Mystic Falls High School.. Maybe Elena would've had a normal life._

_But then again, speaking about flawless, how could he be so selfish to think of that?_

_He could have never done something like that to his brother._

_Elena Gilbert was the reason why the Salvatores had found each other again. The purest explanation to their reunion. _

_And one of the main causes why Katherine Pierce had basically happened to live a close experience to theirs._

_._

_Watching the scene in front of him, Stefan neared Damon and the vampire who just a few days before had claimed her endlessly love towards him._

"_You should bring her home" he murmured, eying the tiny figure of the human cradled in his older brother's broad chest._

_Damon nodded, silent, never removing his concerned gaze from Elena._

_._

_Katherine approached the blue-eyed Salvatore, staring into his eyes for a little while before landing her brown and full-of-sympathy depths on the girl in his embrace._

_She gently removed one strand of chocolate hair that fell over Elena's face._

_At both Salvatore's unexpected expressions, Katherine let it drop, ignoring their unspoken questions._

_She caressed motherly the rosy cheek of the girl, stained with salty drops, and shook her head._

"_She's the best thing that could have happened to all of us." Was the whispered statement, to which everybody silently agreed._

_Why was Katherine chocking up with threatening tears? Where did all this humanity come from?_

_._

"_I'm sorry" were the abrupt words that left almost soundlessly Damon's lips, echoing in the dead silence of the night. It seemed like if the world had stopped to watch the occurring event._

_Apologies made after one century and a half of awaiting . The reunion of two brothers, who'd always needed each other but denied for proud. For love._

_Everything was getting even, promising peace after the storm._

"_I didn't mean what I said to you before I left. I never do." His blue eyes were two crystal balls, where you could lose yourself into, reading the answers you'd be seeking._

_Damon had let his walls down, he was being the better man._

"_No. You were right" Katherine murmured, never losing his gaze, not now that she could finally _see _him._

"_I'll try to be the better woman" she grinned, referring to a silent joke both three vampires got, as Damon grinned back, seen his train of thoughts._

"_Start fresh" Damon quoted Elena, sarcastically. Because that's what she would have said if she had been awake in that moment._

_Stefan smirked, as Katherine answered. "Memories are too important to be forgotten." She stopped to look at both of the men she had once loved at the same time, realizing a piece of her was by now lost in the brothers' souls. "I've never done it with either of you. It's just gonna take a huge journal to write these latter year down, though"_

"_Are you leaving?" Stefan chocked out, gaining a puzzled look from his brother._

_Katherine let a genuine yet pleased smile appear._

_Damon had to admit it was the first time after 147 years that he saw her actually showing feelings opposite to rage, revenge or badness . _

_._

"_I'm not." She shook her head, nullifying the distance with the eldest Salvatore, and extending her arms towards Elena. _

_He reluctantly set her in Katherine's arms, even if she was able to hold her tight._

"_I need my family." The words spoken by the girl were effective enough to leave the guys in an astonished silent. "I'm not leaving her. "_

_With that, she made her exit greeting the Salvatores goodnight. "I'll let you two a moment. See you later."_

_._

"_I'll be the best sister you've ever heard about" she smiled tenderly at the twin in her arms, and blurred into the night._

_._

_._

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_._

_Stefan awaited some minutes, to sort things up in his mind. He knew Katherine had left in order to leave the two some space._

"_You know she's never gonna recover after this." The younger Salvatore hesitantly alerted his brother, afraid himself to speak those fears aloud. _

_It had been almost two years Elena was dealing with supernatural. That night had been the last straw._

_Damon finally raised his eyes from the darkness of the ground. "What do you mean?" _

_The coldness that was his tone had Stefan stumble upon his words._

"_That maybe.." there was a sigh "She should forget."_

_Damon's eyes burnt with an unknown light. Determination? Protection? Anger?_

_How could Stefan underestimate her even after tonight?_

"_Never." His tone was severe . "Elena is strong. She's the strongest of us all."_

_._

_There was a brief pause, that gifted the voice of the eldest Salvatore with more sadness._

Time for the big talk_ he told himself._

"_You know what? I've struggled the whole time, ever since I met her. I've fought to keep her alive, to be the better man. To find my brother back. And the whole time, she's been there. Our child is the only proof I can give her to prove my promise. I'll never leave her alone."_

_One single tear traced an unexpected and confuse pattern down Damon's cheek. They were so not used to come out of those eyes, that had no idea of the path to take._

_Damon didn't cry. Did he?_

_The sudden and unwanted action got him unsettled, vulnerable. His unsteady voice was the reflection of what was going on inside._

"_I love her." He admitted. "And all the things that make her who she is today, it's what her past did to her. I'll never, ever take anything away from her. Good or bad that it is. I'll love her, no matter what she'll become after this."_

_That was enough._

_There you see, how real love can change even the evil._

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.

"Has it really happened?" Elena whispered, knowing that during her replaying of those vivid and recent memories, Damon had woken up.

Little did she know that he'd been doing just the same.

She slowly lifted her face, somehow intimidated and afraid of the answer, which the deaf voice that was her subconscious suggested as positive.

"Our baby.." she hesitated, her whisper became a murmur, till the sound faded away.

.

He met her eyes, swollen from the long and much needed hours of sleeping. Her face was quite pale, not in her usual olive skin tone. And those brown depths looked for support in his oceans, as if they were a solid cliff in the middle of a thunderstorm.

"Yes to both" he leaned in, cupping her face. "Yes Elena. We're okay. Our baby is alive."

His smile lit up one of the best mornings in her life, as a real reflection of it appeared on her lips.

After too long.

.

Damon actually felt something burning in his chest. Could it be so real, so evident? Could his love be so much to affect him physically ?

Maybe it really was.

"Our baby" she whispered, savoring the moment, and matching her fingers with his, placing their palms on her small bump.

"Good morning to you, too." He chuckled, then neared his face to Elena's belly.

She looked at him puzzled, and caressed his ebony and soft hair.

"Hello, little boy" he whispered, patting in the slightest touch her covered flesh.

Damon then leaned in and kissed tenderly the spot.

It was their baby.

And it went beyond any of his expectations .

Maybe his pain was being paid back, in the best way possible.

All those years spent hurting, were worth something.

Surely, he'd have relieved them a hundred times if it meant then meeting Elena.

.

.

All of a sudden, he heard her breaths become labored and uncontrolled.

When he looked up to check on her, she had tears streaming down her face.

"Hey" he reassured her, getting to cup her face in his hands. "What is it?"

She didn't try to avoid his gaze, instead she profited of that blue stare to reflect even more love in it.

"Do you think it's a boy?" she questioned, her voice cracked with emotion.

He was puzzled, not following her train of thoughts. Did she just cry for that ?

"That's why you were crying?" he questioned, amused, trying to hold back his giggle.

She ignored him, muttering an insult. "Smartass." She accused, turning for one brief second her face away. He was so good into ruining romantic moments, she thought.

.

"It was a perfect moment." Elena complained, slightly pissed off.

Then his hands caught her face again.

"It still is" was his whisper.

.

They locked gazes.

Their lips met.

And for one long hour there was nothing else.

Just their body meeting. Just their souls connecting.

.

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_**I'm super glad I got to the 100 reviews, and we're still on the road with the story!**_

_**So , thank you so freaking much. You know this means a lot and bla bla bla.. ! What else can I say?**_

_**I LOVE YOU GUYS!**_

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_**Let's look forward to the 150, shall we? **_

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_**HAPPY EASTER EVERYBODY!**_


	21. Chapter 21

_**Hey y'all! 5 pages of pure smut. I'd say… Finally! Damon and Elena deserved this intimate moment.**_

_**And more stuff to come, at the end of the chapter. Cliffhanger, maybe? Read and see!**_

_**.**_

_**I'm so waiting for your feedbacks guys. This chapter took a mental effort to me, literally! I can't wait to find out whatcha think about it!**_

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**Heaven doesn't seem so unreachable**

.

She heaved heavily to store as much strength and power to kiss him as she could manage, cradled protectively under his broad chest.

Elena used deep breaths in order not to miss the unique scent that made her found home again. Just that, was enough to make her feel in heaven.

Damon brushed so slightly her rosy cheeks, admiring the way her skin was flawless and tender under his touch. He trailed a soft path of loving kisses along her jaw line , resting calmly on the corner of her lips.

.

She took a deep sigh, and locked her slender fingers at the base of his head, in between his ebony strands of wavy hair.

"Look at me" he whispered the request, not even trying to deny the plead that fully coated his voice.

He needed to lose himself in those beautiful eyes again, he craved for that more than anything else in the moment.

Elena locked her gaze into the unbelievable fairness of his, chocking on her labored breaths for how stunning he looked, as if she were meeting him for the first time.

.

"I hope the baby will look just like you. " she admitted, stroking in awe his face. "At least, I hope he'll have your eyes." A tender smile lit her lips up, warming in reflection his heart.

"I can't believe I have you" he let out, in surrender. "I can't believe you're carrying our son" his voice was the furthest thing to steady, and Elena noticed that.

She, in the first place, was the one who got teary eyes hearing him pronouncing those words.

"You do, Damon." She answered, readily. And she was glad she hadn't doubted him for even a second.

Elena was glad she had seen right through those thick walls he used to protect him with, ever since the first moment she'd met him.

"You've lived in misery for too long. It's time for you to be happy." She cupped her tiny yet confident hands around the perfect frame of his face, ensuring he was looking into her depths. "I'm yours. I could never be anyone else's. I've always meant to be with you. And I'm sorry if it took so long for me to figure it out."

.

She nullified the short distance between their lips, but once she was about to kiss him, she stopped to whisper the most important thing ever. The thing she'd have never gotten used or bored to say.

"I love you, Damon Salvatore. That's the explanation."

.

It was enough with words.

He had to love her in every possible way.

The kiss they threw themselves into was passionate, craved, urgent. They had been apart for too long.

Damon took his time to savor her mouth, dedicating a special attention to her belly, never crashing his whole weight on her.

Surely she didn't miss the way his attentive manners were being shown. That only made Elena wonder what a wonderful father he would be. What a lucky girl she was.

Maybe Damon was the gift her parents were sending her from above. A _blessing._

And she didn't care anymore about all the pain she had to bear in the supernatural world, if that meant being with him. She would have done everything a hundred times again, but still would love him the same.

.

He easily found his way to her sweater pants, sliding them down painfully slowly.

She shivered, due to the change of temperature of her already heated-up body.

"Are you cold?" he asked lowly in her ear, careful to her needs.

"I don't care" she replied, hurrying her trembling hands to unbutton his dark shirt.

He smirked his usual smirk, back on his old self mode, and that made every piece fit in the puzzle.

Nothing had changed between them. Even though everything else had mutated in the surroundings, they still were the ones they used to be before the storm.

.

He backed off, still a grin traced on his lips, and stared. That was what made the air grow with needing smells around them, causing Damon's pride and ego to raise even more than in his average days.

"Well, I do" He grabbed the covers and threw it on them, while they occupied themselves by intertwining their bodies and trying to get all the piece of clothes off.

.

When it came to his pants, Elena smirked satisfied. "Still no underwear?"

"Guess what? Less clothes, the better" he replied distraught, nibbling at the delicate skin of her neck.

She couldn't help but let a moan out, unconsciously getting him even harder.

Her eyes reflected darkness in his, full of urgent lust and desire.

But they didn't rush.

They took it slow, enjoying and savoring every instant they had been given.

.

One of his hands went downwards, resting on her lower womb. Damon caressed it with tenderness, as his lips began a new wet path down to her neck.

When he reached her nipples , his tongue played along with the hardened skin , until he could feel her hips inch forward his lower body.

It was astonishing how sexy she could become at her unbeknown . The thought only drove him crazier, applying more pressure on her breasts, to the point Damon left small bites that still didn't pierce her skin.

"You can do it" she consented, her breathing uneven.

"Sh" he murmured, placing his index finger on her lips. Then , with his other hand, he wandered on her belly, silently explaining the reason why he wouldn't do that.

.

With his hand still on the place, he lowered them so slowly to the point her breaths had calmed down.

His fingers slid slowly in her nether lips, enjoying the sensation of heat that her body emanated.

He took a deep breath, closing his eyes for one second.

.

She profited of the momentary absence of his attention to drive her hands on his member, wrapping it tightly around it.

He hissed, taken aback, widening his eyes abruptly.

"God.." he murmured, as she worked her way up and down around it.

With her other hand, Elena didn't lose the contact of his face, caressing it and catching each drop of sweat that appeared more and more frequently with the enhancing ticking of seconds.

A short while later, his strong grip went to hold her busy hand, stopping Elena in the middle of the work.

"Today is mine." He explained, when she eyed him puzzled. "I'll please you in every possible way. Let me do the dirty work" a smirk crossed his lips, glad she didn't complain.

Of course, the fact that his fingers began to move into her helped. _Quite_ a lot.

.

"Damon" she breathed in, closing her eyes and moving her hips toward him.

He backed off a few inches, admiring the young woman before him losing herself in the total awe of pleasure.

Elena kept her mouth ajar, her eyebrows narrowed whenever he thrust one more of his fingers inside of her.

When Damon began to brush less tenderly her inner walls, that was when her moans began.

.

He got completely hardened at the sight in front of him, driving his fourth finger inside of her core.

She grabbed the sheets in her fists, channeling whatever she tried to suppress inside of her.

"Don't hold back, Elena" he suggested, knowing she was one step from getting really vocal.

That simple sentence was enough for her to let out a scream of pleasure that drove her off the edge, rotating her hips along with his moves.

"Oh God,Damon."

.

When she abandoned herself to the inevitable numbness , Damon profited of the moment of weakness to spread her placid legs apart.

She whistled in surprise, raising her head to give a quick glance in between them.

Elena saw the way his lips showed a witty smirk, his eyes shining with lust and preparation.

Taking in a deep sighs, she decided she'd have him have his way.

Her head was let free to fall uncaringly back on the pillow, as his tongue hesitated on purpose on her nether regions.

.

One more moan was heard from her part, as Damon began to give the right treatment to the most sensitive spot down there.

When he began to work on it more swiftly, she took a tight hold of his hair, nearing his face to her core.

She squinted her eyes, murmuring nonsense curses and prompts.

"Yes, please" she spoke aloud, alerting him. "I'm so close, Damon. Hell."

And for the second time in a few minutes, one more orgasm brought her down the cliff of pleasure.

.

His body was now hovering over hers, he was breathing heavily next to her ear.

One second and he was at the foot of the bed, his hands grabbing firmly the hold of her ankles.

Damon pulled at a supernatural speed Elena down to him, to the point that she had her legs hung loosed, the tips of her toes touching the floor.

He locked gazes with her.

She seemed disoriented and taken aback from his gestures.

"Turn" his authoritarian voice commanded, as she obeyed soon after.

That action of submission got both of them really aroused. He knew she wasn't objecting on her will, but still he enjoyed being powerful.

Damon grabbed tightly her ass, squeezing it in his palms as she moaned.

.

Elena placed her hands on the bed, steadying her feet to the ground and raising her hips so that he could have a full access to her core.

That position was something new to her. And it was the reason why she wasn't complaining about doing something else. Even if she was a little afraid, she trusted him.

.

Damon swore to himself he was about to explode. He couldn't take no more.

And because of that, his long member was pushed hardly inside of her.

Elena screamed, and he stopped dead in his tracks, widening his eyes.

"Did I hurt you?" he asked, fearing he'd been too harsh .

"Fuck me, already!" she spat, finding it hard to talk and prove him wrong. "You didn't, Damon." She managed to say then, more tenderly.

He enjoyed the way she liked it rough.

And smile lit up, while he murmured. "God, I've missed this"

.

His length was thrust harder inside of her with every growing moan that she left.

A few minutes later, it was a sure thing people living in the nearer blocks of the Boarding House had heard and deduced what was going on at the Salvatore's.

He moaned along with her, at her suggestions of _"screwing her harder"._

Their sweaty fleshes accompanied the noises and smells of sex that invaded the room.

.

Her eyes were glassy, her mind was blank just as much as numbness crossed his thoughts.

They could feel nothing else but the pleasure that the connection of their bodies gifted them.

And the moment they reached their climax, heaven didn't seem so unreachable.

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_Boarding House - Some hours later_

.

"Will you pass me the soap?" she asked him, disoriented in the huge wall shower.

Elena looked around, realizing it was as big as half of her biggest bathroom.

He smirked, satisfied for both her appreciation and the occurring event. Like if he hadn't had enough of cuddling and touching her.

He turned to the bowl of soap bar on the counter and headed back to her at vampire speed, while she just enjoyed staying under the copious splashes of warm water with a relaxed expression, her eyes closed.

.

The strands of dark hair framed her face, becoming one thing with her skin, which seemed to stand out even more. Her features were glowing under the dim morning light filtering from the window right above the shower, and the effect of the tiniest drops of water living and moving on her flawless flesh added that touch of perfection that he was certain there was nowhere else to be found.

None other women could be compared to the beauty that for him, Elena was.

And the picture in front of him was so unreal, that it made Damon even more aware of the fact that she could never belong to a common, superficial world . But to something major. Impossible to conquer, impossible to reach.

.

"Hey" she finally opened her eyes, her smile reaching quickly her eyes, which became like the one of a young kid. "Will you stay here contemplating your shower any longer?"

An embarrassed and soft giggle echoed in the endless space of the service room.

He shook his head, gaining back what was a reflection of her expression. "Sorry. Still gotta get used to it."

Damon blurred right next to Elena, as she tilted her face to the side, studying his visage .

"Of me, showering?" another giggle from her. "I can bet you've tried to spy on me ever since the first times we met."

He faked hurt, placing his hands crossed on the spot of his frozen heart.

"Me? So lame?" his voice was the exact opposite of the words that were spoken.

Elena let out a short laugh, trying to contain herself and look at least annoyed. "Sure. I knew you'd tried that"

.

He suddenly grabbed her by her upper arms, abruptly turning her to the point her lower back was stroking his length.

She held back a whistle, taken visibly aback.

"I've never, ever spied on you." Was his cool and promising murmur in her ear, which gained a long shiver throughout her entire body. "You _were_ not mine. You didn't wanna be"

That short sentence made Elena's heart stumble in her chest, realizing the guilt of his sufferance would have never gone away.

"Damon…" she pleaded, in a complete different tone of the last time she'd spoken.

"What I mean is." He stopped, running one hand down to her delicate and slippery womb. Then Damon trailed a hot path of kisses down to her jaw line. That provoked another suppressed whistle from her part.

"That it'd have been masochistic and wrong of me. I could have never gotten the chance of doing this…"

And with that said, came the accompanying gesture to slid his right hand lower and lower. Until he reached her most intimate part.

"Or this" he kissed the spot right behind the heat of her left ear, gaining a shivering that could be compared to coldness.

"Please" she whispered, turning around suddenly and launching herself into an eager kiss.

.

When the making out session was over, he finally began to brush her to remove all the smells of himself on her. Even if –_truth being said-_ he'd have preferred them to stick on her skin.

She was brushing herself with a sponge, lightly on her womb, when he heard her snort.

"That was for…?" he let it hung , raising an eyebrow.

"I'm getting fat. And it's only been two weeks. I just wish I didn't have those cravings. Not just right during my…" Elena lowered her face, escaping his gaze. "My recover."

Damon suppressed a sigh. He knew the physical image issues were still populating the meanders of her darkest corners of the mind. She just hadn't had the time to process everything, after the sending back to 1864 and the kidnapping of Esther.

.

"Listen to me" he stopped her hands from wandering on her belly, to then lock their gazes."Do you trust me?" he demanded like if it was the most important question of the world.

As blue melt with brown, she found herself nodding, trying to swallow back the growing lump in her throat.

"This." He eyed the spot where their flesh met. She followed his glance, and when they locked their depths again, Damon firmly spoke. "This is not _fat_."

She held back what she felt were tears threatening to come up.

"You're pregnant, Elena. It's our child inside there."

.

And as his words came flowing out, he_ realized_.

Elena hadn't been eating more than she normally would. At it had only been two weeks, after all.

Then… Why were his fingers now touching the closest thing to a _belly bump_?

Freezing deadly in his tracks, Damon widened his eyes and knew it wasn't over.


	22. Chapter 22

_**So. Hey everybody! I wasn't supposed to update today, but since it's Delena's night –TVD is airing in a short while- and there's this loving mood going on inside of me (and on Twitter), I decided I might give it a try, even if I've been feeling shitty the whole day.[fever got me, yay!]  
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_**Hope you won't throw tomatoes at me! Plus, hope to clear every doubt! [nonametoday ! :D ]**_

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_**More complications.**_

.

"Are you okay?" a suspicious gaze was given from her to him, as Damon evidently failed to mask his now growing inner doubts.

"Sure." He rushed to mutter, looking away on purpose.

She stared at his bare back, her expression full of unanswered questions.

Where did all this come from? He'd been cheerful and unconcerned just until a few seconds before.

"So, let's get you out of here before you take a cold" he told her while handling her a black towel, clearly avoiding her gaze.

.

"Damon" she called, firmly. "What's wrong?" her question didn't come out as loudly as she wanted to.

So, Elena took a few steps to get out of the shower and reach his face, to then cup it in her small hands.

"What it is?" she whispered, brushing the tip of her thumbs on the outer corners of his soft lips.

He gathered all of his control to smile, but that was something that didn't help. Because it didn't reach his expressive eyes, still full of twisted and mixed emotions.

"It's nothing" he murmured back, and closed his eyes under the effect of her tender touch.

.

His hands caressed her own, then traced a path that went straight to her womb.

"I love you" were his words, before-with a lame excuse- he succeeded to take off.

.

Damon dressed up quickly and decided it was time to have one of those strategic talks with his baby brother.

"Stefan" he called pouting out loud, not caring he might have been still asleep. "C'mon, time to wake up dicky head."

The eldest Salvatore went blurring in his younger brother's corridor and knocked repetitively on his bedroom's door.

"What the hell, Damon?" he heard him mutter a curse under his breath once on the threshold.

When Stefan sprung the door open, any kind of insult that was about to be given to his brother, was held back.

His blue gaze was worn off and nowhere close to the cocky look it was used to be showing.

"What's wrong?" Stefan asked, stepping out of his room and carefully closing the door behind.

Damon let his suspicion spoken. "Who are you hiding?"

The guilty Salvatore shrugged casually. "Nobody."

The lie, anyway, was nowhere to be believed. Reasoning for a short while, Damon stayed silent to then goggle his eyes in surprise.

"Is Katherine in there?"

Stefan seemed uncomfortable. "None of your business."

"Did you guys sleep together?" Damon ignored his brother's alert, still not getting how that could have happened.

.

What he appreciated, anyway, was the fact that the woman in the room didn't put herself in the middle of the conversation, even if she was surely hearing everything going on outside.

" She just stayed with me last night. Nothing happened." He murmured, not losing his brother's gaze. "She needs a chance."

Damon nodded silently, considering it was not the right time to talk about his brother's love relationships.

.

"I have a problem. " the eldest Salvatore stated, in alert. "With Elena."

Stefan stilled . "What is that?"

In the same exact moment, Katherine peeked from the ajar door in her black lacy underwear.

"What's wrong with her?" she asked, her brows narrowed.

"Something with the baby." Damon lowed his voice to the maximum, to avoid its breakpoint.

Both of the vampires in front of him stopped abruptly.

"What do you mean?" Katherine demanded, aware and almost afraid of the answer.

"That we have to talk to Bonnie. Get her here, and have Elena distracted. I don't want to alarm her or have her over thinking about it now. We just freed of those Originals. It's too much." Damon confessed, shaking his head.

"Hey" Stefan called for his attention by squeezing his shoulders. "She's gonna be okay, whatever it is. We've been through worst."

.

He was right.

But how could they take any chance about Elena's life or the baby's? They could not allow themselves to take anything for granted .

Those were Damon's thoughts on his way to the Bennett's .

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"Where is Elena?" her best friend assured, once in the parlor.

"_Caroline_. Enough said" Damon hurried to explain, eager for answers.

"So?" Bonnie prompted him to talk, while everybody had their ears up, ready to take in whatever was going to come.

"We sent her back to 1864 two weeks ago,right?"

At Damon's question, both his brother and Katherine nodded.

"Father had her have a doctor to check on her health, back then. When he got mad at Elena, he screamed, claiming her to be seven weeks pregnant."

He stopped for a while to figure out how much the pieces in the puzzle just _didn't_ fit.

"But we had… slept together just one week before."

The rest was hung eloquently in the air.

.

When he was able to keep on going with his twisted story, he poured himself a strong dose of Whiskey.

"Then why when she was showering, this morning, she had a belly bump?"

His voice muted from unexpected detachment to madness. Damon's eyes pierced the blackness of the witch's, clearly referring his question to her.

"Wait." Stefan raised his gaze, setting Bonnie free from his brother's daggers. "What if.."

"_Finn_" Katherine spat out in disgust and astonishment.

"No." she then added, trying to reassure herself with her own words. That would have meant the death of Elena. "It can't be."

Bonnie stilled. "When did he try to.. to..rape her?" was her mere whisper, referred to nobody in particular.

"Tops one month ago " Damon answered, readily. "That wouldn't explain the bump. It's still too early."

"Plus" Katherine interrupted, again. "Vampires can't procreate."

"But what do we know about Originals?" Stefan questioned, planting a steadier doubt. "They have nothing to do with our abilities."

.

Damon couldn't take no more of the talk.

Was he really discussing about the odds of Elena's baby, being his own?

But then a sudden revelation got the heavy heart he had quickly away.

"The _vampire bastard_ never actually… " Katherine hesitated. "He didn't have it with her. Just with me."

The revelation got Stefan to quickly raise his head up to her, and had the others in the room silent.

Nobody had known that. Katherine had just stayed quiet, living with the humiliation inside.

When you learn to be selfish, you end up alone. That was equal to the fact that you ended up suffering _alone._

Little did she know that she had been wrong about that.

.

Damon let out an audible sigh of relief, that soon was blown away by Bonnie's concerned expression.

"There's no doubt then the baby's yours. What I'm not sure of is if.."

"If what, Bonnie?" The stare that she earned was threatening enough to prompt her to keep on talking.

"If any of them is going to make it through _alive _from this."

.

"What the hell are you talking about?"

The three of them turned to see what they had least expected to cross the threshold of the mansion's entrance doors.


	23. Chapter 23

_**Hello everybody! **_

_**Thank you so much for all the feedbacks and positive comments on the story. I read, appreciate, and love them all! I know a bunch of people might hate me after this… But believe me, it's worth the reading till the very end. **_

_**I love the characters. Enough said as spoilers alert.**_

_**Enjoy!**_

_**And let me know what you guys think!**_

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_**Heaviness of Revelations**_

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The three vampires in the room had their minds full with curses to each other.

How the hell could they be so deaf not to hear Elena coming?

.

"Bonnie.." the girl murmured, taking hesitant steps ahead, towards her best friend. "What's going on?" the whisper was a complete reflection of her external, careful attitude.

The powerful witch had her eyes narrowed, bracing herself for what she would be about to reveal.

"Elena.."

Damon's fiery-hot gaze fell over Bonnie's , emanating invisible threats that were quickly sensed by the enhanced feelings of the young Bennett. _If looks could kill.._

Of course, none of the presents in the room let that exchange slip away with no commentary along the way. _Of course_ Elena had to object.

"What is it that you're all hiding?" her voice was on the verge of suspicion and frustration, her hands gestured towards the four guilty beings .

When no answer was given, and silence became too oppressing , it was Damon's turn to respond .

"Fine."

.

Astonishment washed over the vampires.

Katherine had thought Damon would have been the first one to keep the doubt about the pregnancy well hidden from Elena, but evidently this was not the case.

She'd almost forgotten about the new, stronger, rougher Damon. The real essence of him, finally being shown after 147 years.

Maybe- the vampire doppelganger hesitated- Damon was always the same. And his love for Elena, which had been there all along, was being proven in that exact moment .

He wouldn't be the one to lie or keep her from the bad things in life just to get her pure and unaffected love.

.

"Is that.. Is that about the baby?" the quickness of her reasoning had everybody taken aback, and, as she reluctantly asked her hands instinctively travelled a swift path down to her womb, which, now in front of everyone's acute sigh , actually presented a small bump sticking out from the navy-red tank she was wearing.

Silence was yet again an eloquent answer, as Elena's eyes wetted with unwanted tears.

"What..is it?" she slightly tilted her head to the side, looking for Damon's gaze, which had fallen to the ground, making her imply that something major had actually occurred .

Elena's gaze automatically went looking for the one, after Damon's, who she trusted the most, and took in Katherine's brown depths, shining in a different light, almost compassionate.

"Please, say something" she begged in a silent murmur.

.

"The baby might not be mine" was the revelation that came to her, from Damon's exhausted voice, bringing along a weird buzzing to her ears that made the room around her spin uncontrollably .

Elena sensed the change of air caused to somebody blurring next to her, supporting her weakened body by the waistline.

"You need to sit down" Katherine's tender voice suggested caring, accompanying the gestures towards the nearest couch. Which happened to be a few feet from Damon.

.

Elena studied numbly the blank spot in front of her , losing herself deep into meditation.

The baby was_ his_. There was nobody else who could have proven her wrong.

"How could you even consider that?" she spat, bitterness catching everybody's attention.

Stefan raised one eyebrow, not expecting the outburst.

She had been on the verge of tears, just a few minutes ago.

.

"Elena" Damon called helplessly, finally letting the great disappointment in his blue puddles reflect in hers, breaking her heart.

"You've been the only one, Damon." She spoke aloud, not afraid that somebody else in the room could have gotten it wrong. "There's no way he's not yours" her hands were stroking gently her belly, again.

Elena, somehow, was certain of that.

Because every time she'd touch the precious that precious spot, she could feel closer to him.

Like if there were an invisible thread connecting and linking them to life. Like a twisted explanation to how Damon had gotten under her skin, her body, her very soul.

Elena knew Damon was the father.

And a mother never mistakes.

.

"That's not what any of us hopes for, Elena. " Stefan called, finally giving her some attention.

She rose her gaze in suspicion, taken aback.

"What, then?"

It was Bonnie who interrupted the conversation, before unneeded commentaries could be made.

"There's no explanation why you showed pregnancy symptoms after the very first days of returning back to the present Mystic Falls. Neither for what Giuseppe said in 1864." There was an eloquent pause. "Remember?"

.

Elena stopped to take it in, recalling her few exchanges with the Salvatore's father, and shivering at the sensation the memory of his slap on her face had over her.

But that was not what mattered right now.

Trying to focus, she squinted her eyes and let her mind wander freely.

"_She's seven weeks pregnant" _ Giuseppe's voice had echoed in the middle of the complete silent, in a burst out that had left all the presents astonished.

.

Seven weeks pregnant.

But… she had just had sex with Damon one week before.

.

Now, back in 2011, it had totally been two weeks . So it should have been two weeks pregnant, right?

Were nurses back then not as professional as today?

Sure thing.

But still, there was something that didn't fit right.

.

"I'm two weeks pregnant." Elena murmured, locking her gaze with her best friend's. "But Giuseppe said I was on my…"

Bonnie raised one eyebrow, as to encourage her to speak aloud what everyone else already knew.

"Seventh week"

In the exact moment the words were spoken, it all felt like if Elena's hands were enlightened by some kind of signals that indicated her the right answer.

.

She stopped. Her mind stopped.

Her _world _stopped.

What did that mean?

.

"Damon" Elena called, not exactly knowing if that gesture was to check on him, or to seek after support in his eyes.

The intensity of his gaze made her breathing crumble. His eyes were in the darkest blues, shiny and glassy enough to render crystal clear what his thoughts and suppositions were.

"D..Damon" she murmured again, her lips trembling in fear.

But he had his sight dropped once again on the ground, enhancing those waterfall to set free and full Elena's features with salty drops.

She realized she was sobbing when a pair of hands stroke gently her shoulders.

"Shh," somebody murmured behind her. "We can't know it for sure." Katherine whispered soothingly in her hair, leaving a kiss in it once in a while.

Elena couldn't stop those drops from rendering her sight blurry.

She couldn't take it in, not for even a second, that her baby was not Damon's.

And that the only man that had touched her seven weeks before had been … the _demon_, Original, Finn.

.

Katherine tried to make Elena's sobs stop.

Damon stood still and emotionless, leaving the others embrace themselves for the outburst the _old self_ would have soon had .

Everyone was observing the scene going on before them like if it was a movie, where you just have to sit and watch, unable and helpless to do anything else.

.

"D..Damon" Elena tried again, not sure if her voice had by now come out, or if she'd just imagined it doing so. "Please.."

Her desperate gaze burned with tears and pain, but when it finally meet the one of her beloved, it was quickly set free by his part. Damon blurred away in a matter of seconds, leaving all the presents astonished by his behavior.

Stefan stood up, following soon after.

.

"Let's get you upstairs, okay?" Katherine tried to distract Elena, who stood utterly disappointed by Damon's flee.

"I'm okay." She cleared her throat. "I can go alone."

Bonnie couldn't believe how much the life of one simple human could be so full of misery, pain and loss.

It wasn't alright. It wasn't balanced.

Her best friend was just eighteen, for God's sake!

.

Elena headed slowly to the exit of the parlor, but once on her way to the stairs, her own body craved for rest. She quickened her pace to get as soon as she could in her bed, needing to sleep it off and hide from everyone pitying or concerning for her.

Just when she thought she had made it, the unstable piece of carpet on the last step had the tip of her foot stumble in it.

Elena held her breath, trying to look for a grip in the middle of the huge stairway. But she was right in the middle of it, far enough from the safeness of the handrail .

In a matter of seconds, she found herself facing the ground, embracing for the worst.

.

* * *

><p>.<p>

"What the hell, Damon, stop!" the younger Salvatore let out the beg for the umpteenth time, raising his arms to the dark blue sky.

He was tired of chasing after his brother all over the woods. But yet, he needed to talk to him.

Stefan had seen the misery and pain reflected in Damon's features, just a signal of how powerful what he had going on on the inside was.

He had been relatively glad about the baby news. That was what both of his loved ones wanted.

Damon and Elena were what the young man had left in the world. Apart from Katherine, but that didn't fit in the matter.

Sure as hell he still loved the human girl, but he loved his brother more than anything else to let that feeling pass him by, pretending and hoping everything, in the end, would be better.

And once again, Katherine crossed his mind, taking a part of merit in the whole rehab process.

.

But why couldn't both he and his brother be happy at the same time? What was wrong with the world?

.

"Damon, either you stop walking or I'll knock you down." Stefan threatened, stopping the chase game. "We're not three years old."

Damon turned, disgust tracing his embittered features.

"He got her pregnant." the edge of loath in his voice had Stefan stumble and hesitate. "That devil, got her pregnant!" the scream echoed throughout the whole forest, maybe –by now- empty.

Because the rage of the blue-eyed Salvatore, was the most powerful thing Stefan had ever experienced. It got to the point of scaring him.

"How am I supposed to _love_…" the last word was said with dead sarcasm, while he paced back and forth with his hands gesturing nonsense. "one thing that I wish I could kill?"

Stefan held his breath, unable to formulate one coherent sentence to make his brother not even more insane.

To his surprise, Damon turned his back to him and slowly began to disappear into the darkness.

"Brother.." Stefan's voice was chocked up in misery and sympathy .

"He spoilt her, brother.." the answer was painfully whispered in the dead silence, while Damon kept his face hidden. "I can't stay here anymore. Or I'd hurt her."

He knew hating the creature growing inside of Elena meant the sufferance of her.

He knew her well enough to be dangerously certain that she'd have never destroyed _it_.

But he would have, if that meant spending one more second in Mystic Falls.

.

When Stefan's phone rang, both of the Salvatores were drawn back from their train of messy thoughts.

"Come here, Elena's hurt." Katherine's voice had the two blurring back to the Boarding House, where it'd all started.

.

* * *

><p>.<p>

"Where's she?" Damon called urgent, on the verge of panic.

"Upstairs." Bonnie let out between her labored breaths, due to the run down the stairs. "Your room".

It took a split of second for him to get where he wanted, and he found himself gripping on the doorstep to keep from falling from whatever was coming next.

"What happened?" Stefan echoed Damon's unspoken question in a whisper.

Katherine raised her glassy eyes from the body before her.

.

Elena was laying on the bed, her eyes closed, showing how purple her eyelids were . Just a reflection of the pale color on her lips. The breaths she released were small and frantic, but they were enough to give everyone hope that she was still alive.

"She fell down the stairs." Katherine murmured, caressing her cheek.

.

Damon blurred next to her, but found himself unable to touch the softness of her skin.

"Why didn't you feed her on your blood?" he bit.

Katherine eyed him unnerved , but tried to keep it low . "I did."

"We don't know why the process is not working how it should" Bonnie came in with her grimoire in hands.

" We think it's because of the.." she let the sentence uncompleted, finding herself in difficulty of saying that word.

"Baby." Stefan spat, bitter.

.

"Damon.." the whisper coming out of her lips had everybody perking up their ears and warming up their hearts. "I want _my_ Damon…"

He didn't know if she were conscious or not, but found himself unable to hold back.

"It was not her fault, Damon…" Katherine murmured, knowing exactly what had been going on. "She didn't ask for this."

With that, he couldn't reject her anymore.

Touching her cheek, reminded him of the reasons why without her he couldn't have lasted any longer.

"I'm sorry" he whispered, leaning in to stroke Elena's lips. "Please, wake up."

One single tear was let out of those deep, selfish oceans, connecting to the coldness of her skin.

.

"You're here" she murmured, opening her wide depths and sensing the intensity of his smell. "Am I dead?" Elena asked then, reluctant .

Looking around she realized she was wrong.

This was his room. And she was very alive, according to the aching pain in her lower back.

"No you're not." Damon replied, giving her some space to breathe. The shadow of his smirk traced a faint line on his lips.

"Ouch" she protested, while trying to stretch out her legs.

"What?" he asked, his voice still hoarse from the pile of heavy emotions carried just until a few instants before.

"Nothing." She justified. "I'm okay"

Elena nodded to give an emphasis to her sentence, looking around to room into everybody's eyes. "I'm feeling better, thank you"

Bonnie, on the other hand, had her gaze fixed onto the yellowed pages of the ancient book.

"Bon?" Elena called, suspicious .

"I found a spell to reveal what we're looking for."

The entity of the discover was having a relative heaviness on everybody's destiny, making their breaths stop in preparation .


	24. Chapter 24

_**LAST CHAPTER BEFORE THE EPILOGUE!**_

_**Okay, listen up guys.**_

_**I thought about it a lot, believe me. And I just came out with the solution of continuing the story in another fan fiction. Here are my explanations :**_

_**First off, it would be impossible to talk about Elena's pregnancy in a couple of chapters. It would be way too superficially written.**_

"_**Hopes in the Darkness" was written following the plot you by now know so well. Elena being sent back to 1864 to get Damon's happened, now. Right? (well, maybe it's Damon's, maybe it's somebody else's. Or maybe who knows. But she's still pregnant!) If I'd keep on writing, it'd become off-track, right?**_

_**Ya'll understand what I'm talking about by reading .**_

_**And don't forget, let me know what you guys think of the story so far. I DO LOVE WHENEVER I GET ONE SINGLE REVIEW FROM YOU. AND APPRECIATE ALL OF THEM.**_

_**SO, OVERALL… WAS IT A GOOD STORY?**_

* * *

><p><em><strong>.<strong>_

**In the end, the undeniable truth.**

.

Damon gazed reluctantly over his shoulder to check on the witch's expression, which, to his uncomfort, was tremendously serious.

"What do you mean you found the spell?" he asked, his voice husky. "For what?"

Elena didn't understand what his question meant. What other motivation ,other than the most obvious, could have it been? Why was he so unsure about what Bonnie had announced?

"The one to check who the father is" the voice of the young but powerful Bennett echoed in the same pride and sureness she had always been so full of.

"Wait.." Elena murmured, now adverting again her head spinning in the tiredness that confusion had provoked in her. This was getting so messed up. "For what else would you need a spell?"

Her eyes searched for the mirror image of hers in Katherine's, who quickly avoided her inquisitor depths to stare too much suspiciously at the imaginary patterns of the silky sheets.

At the sudden and eloquent silence, the poor doppelganger tried again, now sure there was something major her friends were keeping her well in the dark from.

"What else are you hiding?" Elena's tone was nowhere to be scared. She'd had enough of it all and wanted to have the truth spat on her face crystal clear.

No_ softening_. Just the plain, undeniable truth .

.

Damon heard the way her mood was quickly switching into a more urgent one, and knowing her well enough, logically got to the point she actually had the right to be answered.

Turning his back slowly and carefully to their audience, he hovered with his broad chest over her face and looked down to lock gazes.

Unconsciously, his hands went protectively down to wrap, in the slightest touch, around the tiny and solid bump on her womb, feeling a sudden sensation of heat and connection that got him distracted for a few seconds.

"This…" he murmured, softly, still in awe for the sensation. "Can you feel it?" by asking so, Damon grabbed one of her small hands to place it in the free zone next to his.

Elena simply nodded, never looking away from the sincerity glowing in his eyes.

"The baby isn't supposed to grow like this." He wanted to chock up on his words, but couldn't. Damon knew he had to show and transmit her safeness; not fear and doubts.

.

She clenched her jaw and internally bit her lower lip, gasping over one labored breath.

"I know" she admitted in an inaudible whisper.

Damon's features showed enough of sadness and sympathy, his dark and defined eyebrows narrowed in response.

Of course she did.

Surely, being the mom, she had figured out it from the moment the small and premature bump had presented itself.

Something wasn't right.

"Damon…" she called, helplessly .

"Mhm?"

"Don't leave ." She begged. "This is our baby. We fought for him."

.

The flowing of emotions hit him like a river in a flood, reminding him how much his impulsivity would have dragged him down to hell, one day.

How could he had even considered leaving his Elena ,just a few moments before, down the woods?

.

"I won't" he let out, in a whisper, which could only be accompanied by a soft stroke of her cheek.

This resembled so much to something they had lived what seemed a life before.

Just two months before, next to the fireplace, when Stefan had bitten her.

When it all had started.

.

The thought gave him enough power to get him through the hell that the next hours would have been.

.

Candles had been lit up, spells were about to be chanted, the air was as tense as ever.

Everything seemed just ready to get the sharpest truth added to the already embittered picture that was by now Damon's existence.

He wasn't ready.

No way in hell.

He had promised her he wouldn't leave. But what could be left of him, after finding out what he thought was a part of himself inside of her being just a dead illusion?

"_Sanctum voix .."_ Bonnie began to murmur like if it were a sung poetry , while Elena laid still on Damon's poster bed, her tiny and trembling hands caressing slightly her womb.

Her breath was labored, her deep brown eyes were glowing in a light that had his heart cringe in his chest, twisting in angst and urgency for her safety.

Just in the moment he looked helplessly at her, she exchanged the same look towards his blue, unstable depths.

"You'll be fine" he whispered, leaning out one cold hand to gently and unsurely stroke her dark strands of hair.

She chocked up on a small sigh, trying to fight hard the urge of letting out tears.

.

"Close your eyes" Bonnie managed to say in between the unknown words of the mysterious language. "The_ father_ will appear in your thoughts."

Elena did as she was asked, suddenly fearing the darkness surrounding her, sensing more and more how much the simple blackness could have changed her life in a couple of instants.

Then the image came.

And it all was shattered to the ground.

.

* * *

><p>.<p>

The Salvatores, Bonnie and Katherine were silent, unable to talk. It was somehow in a way that could be considered one of the worst mental tortures .

Then Elena's heart stopped beating, all of a sudden.

Just like if the others' vampire breathings were depending on hers, everybody stopped giving air to their lungs in the same moment she did.

Just when Damon was about to react, the abrupt but hopeful sound echoed in the room again, now at a speed that could have been enough to make her heart flee out of her chest.

Everybody closed up the distance between her, ready for the worst.

Then Elena's breaths jumped the cliff of the frenzy, becoming extremely frantic, enough to make them believe they were about to lose her.

"What the hell, Bonnie!" Stefan blurt out, shaking Elena's freezing arm.

"It's working" the witch whispered back, conscious her best friend was able to hear what was going on.

And that by now, the truth had been revealed.

.

She could just not believe it.

_Damon._

_Damon._

It was her Damon.

Her baby was _his._

.

The first thing she saw was the fairness of her depths, and the more she would wait, the more his face became visible.

And she just couldn't believe it.

She had been right, all along.

.

.

* * *

><p>.<p>

.

"Oh my God.." Katherine commented in the exact second her twin had her eyes widened, abruptly and urgently, like a blind seeing the light for the first time.

Elena took one second to breathe unevenly, then seated in a sudden movement.

Her hands went on her lower womb, and her gaze was hidden for a short moment, which had everybody's hopes kept of a thin thread teased by a razor.

"Damon" she exhaled , in the same instant she locked her gaze with the desperate of his.

The young man's heart melted, leaving in the same spot of his undead heart a fire that seemed to irradiate life throughout his body.

And for the first time, after 147 years, Damon Salvatore cried in joy.

.

After one second of hesitation, she threw herself in his strong embrace, reminiscing the smell of his flesh that by then she could call home.

"I love you so much" Elena whispered, while his tears quickly traced paths that falling down his cheeks reached her face.

She stroked his cheeks, whispering the same three words over and over again.

"This is our baby" he let out, in unbelief.

Elena decided she could have allowed herself to cry. After all, it was pure awe and joy .

"She really is." Her giggle grew louder when his brows narrowed.

"Didn't you think it was a boy?" he asked in suspicion.

A warm smile lit her perfect face, finally free of worries and issues. And right now, Elena looked finally like an eighteen years old .

A young woman, _a big girl_ .

And maybe –she thought- all the hurt she had been suffering of, was now going to be paid back.

.

"Yes." She announced, sure of herself. " And I want to call her Nadie"


	25. Chapter 25

_**HELLO!**_

_**Finally, or I'd say.. sadly, this story is over. For now.**_

_**I have to thank every single one of you who read this, right in this moment, and that has been doing the same all these months.**_

_**I love you so much for enjoying, commenting and following my work. It means the world to me, you can't even imagine. **_

_**I promise you guys I'm not letting this end like this. **_

_**It's May,school's almost over, and I'll have to concentrate on it firstly.. But then there will be plenty of time to dedicate to the continuation of the story. **_

_**.**_

_**Even if not all of you has reviewed and private-messaged me, I would like to say… STEP AHEAND and say "Hello!" ! C'mon, I don't bite! (I wish!) . I would like to get to know you guys, and if you're wondering… I have a twitter . **__**mirianatangari**__** . Follow me for updates **_

_**.**_

_**Talk to you soon, lovelies!**_

_**.**_

* * *

><p><em><strong>.<strong>_

_**EPILOGUE**_

_**Hopes in the Darkness**_

.

As days passed by, the vivid memory of the whole nightmare their lives had been in the past one month, began to set in.

It all had started with Stefan's departure. Soon after had followed Elena's issue and deny towards her body, her image and the whole destroying thoughts that had led her on the road of no return.

But just when Damon had almost succeeded in his task, getting her to the point of realization of how much she could –or better, _was_- loved.. The Originals had stepped in the picture, as Finn and Klaus had torn the pieces of her broken soul even more.

Elena was no longer recoverable.

Finn's abuse on her had been the climax of the endless pile of pain weighting on her mind, which was far from being comparable to the one of an average human.

A common being would have been destroyed at the first battles the supernatural world would have proposed. She, instead, had already been way stronger and more stubborn than anyone in Mystic Falls, in the whole world, but that .. that act with no dignity had been the last straw that had gotten everything speed downhill, in the pitch dark.

.

Damon loved Elena, more than he could even realize, more than he could even admit to himself.

She was his own weakness, his personal sin, his undeniable weak spot.

And she, deep down, had began to slowly admit to herself what a solid and tight rope Damon constituted for her, meaning the only element that could connect her to Earth, that could keep her soul attracted to this world, instead of searching for the peace of the Unknown.

That was basically what their love had become .

Need, crave, _completeness_. And unpredictable strength, that seemed to increase with each battle both of the lovers faced.

It seemed like if the more they suffered, the more they found loving each other. The more it rained, the more the short-living rainbow shone above their heads, afterwards.

That was why that dangerous world belonged to them. It was a place filled with daily struggles, wars . But it was the same place that had given them a reason to live.

That had been why they had found their _hopes in the darkness._

.

Damon had become the better man. Better than even she could have ever imagined.

And Elena, on the other hand, had grown strong and beautiful. Not only on the outside, that was undeniable, but also on the inside, where her inner self had discovered horizons never explored before.

And over time, she had developed the needs of a woman.

Her request could be summarized in just two simple,basic words: Damon's baby.

And how could he deny the one thing that he found himself needing just as much as she did, at the end of the day?

And there you go, another battle to face, more choices to make.

Going back to 1864 had been one of the most singular experiences for her to accomplish .

Elena had learnt even more about him, and never got tired of that. After all, she had been alive only for eighteen years of his life!

And Katherine.. Elena had learnt to consider that woman, who everybody thought as a selfish, manipulating bitch, as her best confident, her best friend… Her sister.

How could that even be possible?

They were relatives, after all, and the young girl had learnt to believe that all the generations that had run in between the two doppelgangers were just a short matter of time, in the endless and eternal world of vampires.

.

After the journey to the old Mystic Falls… Elena had gotten back carrying inside of her a new life, soon to be in danger.

Again, the last struggle, until a few days before these pages were written.

.

"So" Stefan recalled everybody's attention, sitting on the massive dark wooden chair that had once belonged to Giuseppe Salvatore, but that by now had a immovable position in a corner of Damon's room. "What if it's a boy?"

The smile of both of the Salvatores was enough to make the two dopplegangers, lying on the huge poster bed, cringe in preparation.

Damon was thrilled at the thought of teaching his son some cool, contact sport like football. And what about going to watch matches together, betting against uncle Stefan?

Or better yet, making the little Salvatore become a womanizer, just like the family tradition wanted?

An evil smile crossed on his perfect lips, gaining a ready response from the girls' part.

"Oh, no way, Damon!" Katherine commented, like if she were disgusted by his unspoken thoughts. "You're not doing that!"

Stefan couldn't hold back his laugh, as Elena raised one eyebrow. "Doing what?" she asked, perplex, but almost convinced on what had been going on on his twisted mind.

"Oh c'mon!" Damon replied, sounding like a kid craving for a chocolate ice cream. "Don't be such a buzz killer!"

Stefan neared his brother, patting sympathetically his shoulder. "No worries, brother. He'll be a Salvatore. Those kind of things kinda can't be held back for too long." And again, a grin showed how much determinate the boys were on the whole matter.

"Oh, no no no" Elena replied, sitting swiftly and pointing her index at the two of them. "You're not doing any of your reckless stuff to _her_" and just like if she were including the baby in the conversation, her tiny palm went to caress the small bump on her womb.

"Her?" Damon raised an eyebrow, taken aback. "Weren't you the one sure of him being… a him?"

A victory grin shone on Katherine's lips, and as her gaze met with Elena's, an exact mirrored copy appeared on the human doppelganger a short while later.

It would have made you freeze cold, the way the two were the copy of the other.

"Call it mother instinct." Elena suggested, winking at the brothers.

"And we've already chosen the name." Katherine announced, pride filling her voice as her chin raised in the air, just like the way she did so often a hundred years ago.

"Yeah, pretty weird" the youngest Salvatore commented, gaining a supporting nod by his brother.

"Careful, uncle Stefan" Elena teased. "Katherine helped the cause."

"Means you're not getting any if you don't say you like it." Damon whispered, but it wasn't low enough for the others not to hear, and Elena couldn't keep a straight face.

If this was meant to be her happy ever after, she would have most likely loved it.

.

.

* * *

><p>.<p>

.

"What does this mean, Damon?" her giggle was suppressed by his voice stroking like if it were a gentle touch her ear.

She shivered, chocking on her short, labored breaths .

"It means I want to love you over again, where it all started"

The black blindfold that covered her wondering eyes was slowly taken away, giving her back the sigh of the breath-taking landscape picturing in front of her, just like a painting of preciousness value.

The old rests of the ancient Salvatore's house was dimly enlightened by the uncountable amount of white candles circling the perimeter of the place, indicating the way to a path of a purple flower that lead right into a dark spot in the middle of it all .

Elena took two minutes of pure awe to get her breathing back to the closest thing to steady.

Her heartbeat, though, was the clearest signal of how much her emotions were overwhelming her.

"Is that.. vervain?" she asked in a low whisper, cut off by his nod.

"That…" he murmured, one more time his lips were so close to the most delicate part of flesh of her neck. "represents the path we've been through. Ever since we met. Rough but tempting, beautiful."

By saying so, Damon let his hand wander down her spine, circling her hipbone, to then meet her trembling and cold fingers.

He kissed the line of her jaw with every beat her heart took, and closed his eyes, not expecting his love for her to come in powerful and intense waves of emotions.

For some seconds they could just hear their own breaths and the deaf sounds their feet made by coming in contact with the ground, nearing the centre spot.

And with each step, one memory was brought to the surface.

When they finally got to the middle, Elena saw a white, silky sheet shining brightly even though the light was a mere stream.

"Is.." she let out, not able to continue when her eyes locked in those oppressing and controlling blue oceans, as she freely let herself drawn in them.

"The sheets of my bed. Our first night together."

The lump in her throat grew bigger, rendering it hard to express even one single feeling in one word.

So she did the only thing that could've showed him how much that meant for her.

.

Throwing herself in the kiss, Elena met his tongue almost instantaneously , not even waiting for the kiss to grow more passionate by taking the first steps.

She needed to feel him, to connect her soul to his.

"Hold on" he pulled back, whispering.

Elena met his eyes, so full of lust that were almost as black as the night.

Her labored breath didn't help her ask the question . "Why?"

"One important thing to say." He announced, his voice completely serious.

As her head took in the whole situation, she begged for it not to be what she was expecting.

"Damon.." she tried to plea with her voice, but he didn't let her finish, of course.

"I love you" and at the admission, his crooked grin made her almost forget she should have slapped him in the face for making her almost die in fear.

"Idiot" she muttered, pulling some strands of ebony hair from the base of his neck.

"Was that supposed to hurt?" Damon demanded, faking innocence.

"I love you" she ignored him, not able to repress the telling him back.

.

As the kiss grew stronger, their clothes were soon ripped away in the dark shadows of the woods, this time the night was willing to help them hide from the rest of the world as their desires quickly covered the heavy smell of the vervain, and a few seconds later there were just the two of them, lying on the pure white of the sheets.

"You ready?" he whispered, his eyes searching for an answer before her own mind could process how to talk.

Elena simply nodded, too drawn into his eyes to even formulate her desperate need.

"Please.." was what she managed to say after a while, as his length fully occupied her.

On the verge of chocking on her breath , she held him tighter, using all of her strength to close up any inch of distance between their bodies.

It was just like the first time, and tears streamed down her face by realizing the pureness of it all, of the joy and the love he could make her feel.

"I love you so much.." she admitted, stroking slightly his cheek.

"Don't cry.." he pleaded, sweat meeting the tips of her fingers .

"I'm happy" was the sentence that made both of them stop for an endless second, filling their heart with so much of everything that rendered it hard for them to work properly. At least, it was her case.

She was happy.

She had said those words, after she'd thought she had lost it all.

Damon just smiled, the purity of his expression lit the world around them more than the small fires on the candles could even manage to do, showing how much his love could overcome the power of nature.

.

And breath after breath, sigh after sigh, their desire got closer to reality, as their bodies and soul became an only, concrete thing.

_**THE END.**_

_**THANK YOU SO MUCH, FROM THE BOTTOM OF MY HEART.**_

_**-Mannie**_


End file.
